The Forgiven
by LifesVictory
Summary: And with destruction comes hope. JS, SM triangle.
1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note: Hope you all like this…I'm going in a bit of a strange direction, so don't hate me. 8-) I own nothing of this.**

**Chapter 1**

**6:02 a.m.**

Jack sat down behind his desk with a cup of hot, black coffee. Vivian tapped on his doorway and smiled warmly.

"You're here early," she chided. Jack smirked into his coffee and expertly took a quick gulp without burning his tongue.

"I could say the same of you," he said hoarsely. Jack looked back up at her with an awkward nod. "It's good to have you back, Viv."

"It's good to_ be_ back." Jack bowed his head over an open case file and leaned back in his chair.

"What's the latest on the Brighton case?"

"We'll have an update by noon," Viv sighed sadly, sitting down on the chair in front of his desk. "No matter how long you give yourself to recover, this job never gets any easier." The corner of Jack's mouth twitched.

"Well," he murmured. "The complimentary grays give a distinguished look, I might say." She ran her eyes over Jack's silver-threaded hair and snorted.

"Speak for yourself," she retorted before standing. "I'll have a new report on your desk by one, okay?"

"That's fine." Vivian nodded and turned to leave. "Take it easy today, Viv." She smiled appreciatively and left Jack to his coffee. He hadn't seen Sam or Martin and they both usually arrived at least a half-hour earlier than he did. Jack shuddered as a cold chill ran through him. It wasn't his problem. It wasn't his concern. It wasn't.

They still hadn't arrived an hour later when he made his way briskly down to the bullpen, lukewarm coffee still in hand. He looked around for a moment and then down at the two team members who sat around before him.

"Have any of you heard from Martin or Sam?" Jack asked, yawning and checking his watch. Danny shrugged.

"Last time I saw either of them was last night at the bar," he replied, checking his watch. "They seemed fine then…" The elevator door slid open, admitting a tall, well-dressed young man with a brown paper bag in one arm. He waved apologetically and sat the bag down on the table.

"Sorry I'm late," Martin greeted them with a nod. "I brought bagels." Vivian and Danny reached for the bag and extracted a variety of rolls and bagels and cream cheese, offering one to Jack. He declined, and took a swallow of coffee. Where was Sam?

"Right," he coughed, stirring himself into action. "New case. Two girls, one twelve and the other sixteen. Last seen around Central Park with a large dog, sort of exotic-looking. Their mother called the police yesterday afternoon about five because they didn't return home." He tossed a large tan file onto the table and put his coffee down.

Danny frowned. "Have we called friends, grandparents even?"

"The family just moved into New York three weeks ago," Vivian informed them, handing out profiles. "The girls are enrolled into a Catholic school down on East 68th Street, and the mother's working at the Met."

"What about the father?" Martin asked.

"Deceased, four years ago," Vivian said. There was silence for a moment before Jack cleared his throat.

"Alright, Danny and Vivian, I need you to go down to their home and get something out of the mother. It takes a lot of money to go to any of those schools; maybe there's something there," Jack said and Vivian stood up, tossing Danny the keys to her car. "Martin, there's only one school on East 68th Street that's Catholic: The Dominican Academy. Talk to the principal, friends, teachers…"

The stairwell door slammed open and through it stormed a highly disheveled, tear-streaked Samantha Spade. They all stared as she stumbled across the floor and sunk into a chair at her desk, not even bothering to remove her coat. Jack tore his eyes away from her and continued with Martin, although he knew he had lost his attention.

"Right, so I need information about what these girls are into, where they go after school, who they talk to. Got it?" Martin nodded, snapping his attention back to business and putting his coat back on. Jack waited for him to say something concerning the slumped over figure at the desk fifty or so feet away from them.

"Sorry for being late," was all he said before grabbing a bagel and crossing the distance from the bullpen to the elevator. What the hell? Jack stared down at his case file and considered a whirlwind of things in a second's time. Should he ignore it, and just return to his office? Or should he ask her what was wrong? Go to her? Do something? Do nothing?

Jack shook his head and took a pumpernickel bagel with plain cream cheese and walked straight to his office, stopping as if by chance beside Sam's desk area. Her head was buried in her arms and her blonde hair stuck out at odd angles. Jack put his case file under his arm and leaned on the wall of her cubical.

"Bagel?"

She glanced up with puffy red eyes overflowing with tears which he had seen only once before. Jack's attention flew to the swollen red mark rising around her left eye. Sam realized where he was staring and quickly looked down.

"Don't start, Jack," she murmured in a broken voice. Jack's mouth gaped wordlessly.

"Did he hit you?" He hissed, eyes boring into hers fiercely. "Sam, I swear to god, if he hit you—" Sam threw her hands on her desk with a loud sob.

"No, Jack, he did _not_ hit me. I fell because I slipped on the ice from my ice tray and bruised my left eye, so let your goddamn sense of chivalry at ease."

She glared at him for a few moments more before standing up and throwing her coat onto her chair. He watched her without saying anything for a second before setting the bagel down on her desk and placing her copy of the case file down with it.

"I'm in my office if you need…" _To talk to me_, he began to say, but the words froze on his lips. "…anything." Jack retreated back to his office and left the door slightly ajar.

After a moment he fell into his chair and ran his hand through his hair, sighing deeply. Get to work. Do something. And for an hour and half that was what he did. He conquered a small mountain of paper work and reviewed the case files for both the Brighton case and the new Romero case with the two girls. Jack stared at their pictures dismally and thought of his daughters. He glanced at his watch, and then his calendar and remembered Hanna had a ballet recital today. Maria sent him a picture of her in her leotard and tights a few weeks earlier. Her whole tiny body, laced in pink and white ribbon, seemed to glow with pride.   
His cell phone buzzed in his pocket. Vivian. The family moved from Boston a few months ago because of a first class rehab center in New York which maintained a level of discretion for its elite patients. She'd received threats from poorer junkies who thought she was buying her way out of the addiction, angry that they were sunk so low on the social ladder that nothing separated them from hell. He thanked her and sent them to the rehab center, feeling a familiar surge of purpose as the case took a swift good turn.

Jack stretched and stood to get a cup of coffee, glancing outside his office as the old coffee maker perked sleepily beside him. It was relatively quiet for a Monday. Usually about this time a concerned relative, parent, friend, or guardian would drag themselves frantically into his office and beg for his help. Usually about this time he would send distraught relatives, parents, friends, or guardians into the waiting rooms and promise to do all he could to help them. However, today the whole floor, though buzzing with activity, seemed to be enveloped in a haze that not even coffee could clear.

Finally, his gaze touched on Samantha's hunched form, now whispering tersely into a telephone. What the hell was going on? He couldn't remember her being so disturbed. She glanced up and their eyes locked. Her face flushed in embarrassment, and she turned away. Jack swallowed hard and closed his eyes. Slowly, the detachment was taking place. Slowly, he began to force himself to separate himself from her.


	2. Chapter 2

**11:34 a.m.**

"Vivian, can I talk to you for a minute?" Vivian's fingers paused on the keyboard as she looked at the half-finished report longingly, just wanting to finish and be through with it. She hated typing reports, typing the conclusions of people's lives.

"Do you think it could wait just a couple more seconds?" Vivian asked nonchalantly, eyes still glued to the screen. Samantha shifted her weight and glanced over her shoulder at Martin and then Jack.

"I really need your help with something, Viv," Sam whispered desperately. Vivian looked up and her lips parted as she saw Samantha's pale, blotchy face. She quickly stood and glanced around.

"Yeah, of course," she murmured, placing a hand on Samantha's lower back and indicating towards the conference room. Sam followed Vivian, locking the door behind her and shutting the blinds. She kept her back to Vivian for a few moments as her quivering hand remained on the doorknob. "Sam, what's going on? You're a wreck."

"I know," Samantha answered, trembling. "I can't help it. I'm falling apart, Viv. I don't know what to do…" Vivian turned Sam around and led her over to a chair at the rosewood table. After a moment, she lifted her face to Vivian's and took a shuddering breath. "Vivian, I'm going to tell you some things and I need you to accept them without judgment. God, I don't think I'll be able to handle it if I knew that you…"

"You know me better than that," Vivian assured her, watching Sam's fingers travel distractedly along her bottom lip. Samantha nodded with a half-hearted smile and took a breath. Her dark brown eyes, full of emotion, slowly moved to Vivian's face.

"I'm pregnant." The words, mentioned only in a breathless whisper, seemed to diffuse into every molecule of the room's atmosphere, drenching them both in a stunned silence. Samantha blanched, and cupped her hand over her mouth. "Oh, God. Now it's true. Before I didn't think it was possible, but now that I've said it…Viv…"

Vivian's body, which had been frozen in surprise, empathy, and a motherly impulse to help, took motion and hugged Sam's trembling form to her. She rocked back and forth as the young woman, days earlier a strong-willed independent federal agent, collapsed into a heap of sobbing and tears,

"Shh," Vivian soothed tearfully. "Shh, it'll be alright, baby. You're going to be alright. I'm going to help you through this, do you hear me? I'm going to be right here." She waited for Sam's sobs to dissipate into a soft crying sound and then a painful silence.

"Sam," Vivian said slowly, trying to be delicate. "Who is the father?" Samantha looked up, eyes wide again and filling with tears.

"I…don't know," she whispered. "My gynecologist says I'm about a month or so pregnant, and a month ago…" Sam couldn't finish her sentence, and Vivian took in a slow breath. She didn't need to say further. A month or so ago Martin and Sam nearly broke apart. A month ago she and Jack were still clinging to what they had. A month or so ago she and Martin got back together and were happy. A month ago was a blur of confusion and emotional chaos.

"Are you going to tell Martin?" Vivian asked gently. Sam shrugged and stood up, pacing back and forth.

"I don't know," Sam burst out angrily. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do! If I tell Martin, he'll ask me to marry him and then we'll have the baby and I'll be Mrs. Samantha Fitzgerald and we'll move to Brooklyn and start a family and live in a three-bedroom townhouse and eat vegetarian omelets every morning and send our children (because he'll want two: a boy and a girl) to school while we hold hands and whisper about how beautiful the sunrise looks before we both head off to work and come home to our happy little lives and wait with baited breath for our children to return from school so we can just hold them all together.

"But what if it's not his, Vivian? What if it's not his? What if I tell him that I'm pregnant and that I'm not sure whose it is? He'll ask me to marry him anyway, but I couldn't. And I'd have to tell Jack, and I don't think I could survive it, that look he'll have in his eyes. I'd ruin him, ruin his family. Maria would take his kids away from him, take his whole life from him. I couldn't be that selfish. But what if it was his child, Vivian? What would I do? He'd sit me down for a long talk and promise to support me and pay child support and do whatever he needed to do to help us, and there I'd be. The whore who screwed Jack Malone and had his illegitimate child, living off of the favors of a middle-aged man with a separate family and a separate life."

She caught her ragged breath and slumped against the wall, sliding down to the floor. Sam looked up at Vivian and shook her head weakly. Vivian stood and walked over to her, sitting down next to where Sam was crouched. Sam leaned her head against Vivian's shoulder while the woman stroked her hair.

"They told me I could still have an abortion," Sam whispered. Vivian paused and looked down at Sam's face which stared out blankly at nothing in particular. "They said if I acted quickly, I could have it done, and it would be over. Like it never happened." She sat frozen there for a moment before looking up at Vivian. "Only, it did happen, Vivian. I know it did. One incomprehensible way or another it happened, and it's not that baby's fault." She tucked her knees to her chest and bit her lip. "Oh, Viv. What am I going to do?"

"I can't answer that one for you, Samantha," Vivian answered, shifting against the wall so that she was more comfortable. "What ever you do choose to do, I'll help you through it. Do you hear me? I'll help you through this. It's hard enough without anyone's judgment on you."

Sam nodded and gave Vivian a long hug before standing up. "Thanks, Vivian. You're one in million, and I don't deserve you." Vivian shook her head with a watery smile. Samantha took a deep breath and dried her eyes, smiling with as much brilliance as she could. "Come on. We have work to do."


	3. Chapter 3

**Author's Note:** Thanks for reading, everyone! I love all the mixed reviews, and welcome more, even if you didn't like it. I'm always trying to get better. Anyway, I'm just going in a different direction, and apologies for Martin's character in this chapter. I was feeling a little out of sorts when I wrote him.Again, I own nothing.**

* * *

Chapter 3**

12:47.

"Hey, babe." Sam jumped and turned to see Martin's smiling face grinning down at her from the gray walls of her cubicle. She glanced around nervously before putting her hand around her face as a shield.

"I told you not to call me that here," Sam whispered. Martin shrugged and pulled up a chair beside her. "What are you doing?" He looked up at her sarcastically.

"Sitting on a chair next to my partner to whom I am going to relay important information about our new case," Martin said in a low, exaggerated whisper. "Don't worry, it happens all the time here. Especially when people come in late." Sam sighed and turned back to her computer. He was not making this easy for her.

"Relax, I'm just playing with you," Martin laughed when he saw her frustration mounting. "Are you alright today? You left early this morning and I barely heard two words from you." He pushed a strand of hair behind her ear and she leaned towards his hand, wanting to be comforted more than his closeness. She drew back and sat up straight in her chair.

"Not now," she murmured, hurriedly opening the digital report of the case file on her desktop. "So what have we got?" Martin began to explain, but was cut off.

"Two girls, fourteen and sixteen, missing at around six last night," Danny announced, dropping the actual file into Sam's lap. "Mother's a recovering druggie, father's deceased, possible lead with the sixteen-year-old girl's boyfriend who saw them last in Central Park."

Sam flipped through the vanilla file and glanced at the two pictures of the girls, eyebrows raised. They couldn't look more different. One had fair, freckled skin and buttery blonde hair, while the other had an olive complexion and dark burgundy hair. The blonde, obviously the elder, was slender, petite, and flashed a brilliant smile. Her sister's picture portrayed her hunched over a small, outdoor garden, face smudged and tall, awkward body straining over a basket of tomato plants.

Martin tapped on the school records with his ridiculously expensive pen. "Vivian checked out the Academy earlier, and as you could have guessed, the older girl is into everything. Volleyball, Tennis, school plays, coalition." Sam looked at the younger sister's record with a pang of sympathy.

"Newspaper, Art club, Speech," Samantha read over teacher comments criticizing her 'sullenness and condescension in the classroom.' She glanced at her transcripts and raised her eyebrows. Apparently, she had every right to condescend. The girl had all A's except for Choir. "Well, her grades are skyrocketing, and her sister is the social queen of the school. Nothing here suggests they had anything to run away from."

"I'd think having a junkie mother is a pretty good reason," Martin mulled. Sam nodded, but shook her head.

"They've never rebelled before," she thought out loud, "Why now, if that's what this is?" Danny bit into a bright red apple and splayed them with apple juice.

"She's right," he agreed, mouth full of apple. Vivian appeared from behind Danny and handed them all a photograph of a black haired teenager with just about everything on his face pierced. "Little sister's boyfriend?"

Vivian shook her head. "Big sister's." Danny choked on his apple and Martin looked up. "Don't judge, boys. We picked him up about an hour ago for possession of marijuana." Her eyes hesitated on Samantha who begged them to move on. "Are you two up for an interrogation, or should I have Jack take care of this?" Martin and Danny stood and made their way toward the interrogation room. Samantha watched them enter the small white room and wondered if the words she spoke there still hung in the air, wondered if Martin would inhale them and immediately interpreted them and came back out and called her a filthy, cheating, whore—

"Samantha," Vivian looked at her concernedly, and watched her thoughts slowly return to earth. "Are you alright?" Sam nodded and tucked the case file and new photos into her briefcase. "You're sure?"

"Never been better," Sam lied easily, knowing Vivian saw right through it, but not caring. "Where am I off to?" Vivian hesitated before telling her.

"Jack's waiting in his office. You two are driving out to Winchester, Virginia."

Sam swallowed the knot forming in her throat. "What's in Virginia?"

"The rehab center Mrs. Romero stayed in before she came here," Vivian answered. Samantha nodded, but frowned.

"Where _is_ Mrs. Romero?" Vivian pointed to the lounge. "She's here? Did we make an arrest?"

"She came of her own will. She says she's not leaving until she sees her daughters again," Vivian sighed. "Well, we can't just throw her out." Samantha nodded before grabbing her jacket and suitcase. "Just keep your head on your shoulders and you'll be fine. Take it slow." Ignoring the comment and squeezing Vivian's hand instead, she made her way to Jack's office.

He was on the phone, turned towards his window with his picture of his daughters in his hands. She thought of backing out and leaving him alone, but instead she stayed and listened.

"You tore your tutu?" Jack's voice was tinged with sadness. "And you kept dancing? That's my girl. I'm proud of you, Lizard. Send Daddy lots of pictures, okay? Alright, I'll talk to you later, honey. Love you." He hung up the phone and sat there for a moment, fingers still hovering over the phone.

Samantha's insides were twisting with guilt and fear and want. She wanted just to spit the words out at him, scream them into his face just to throw any remaining safety between them to hell. Instead, she cleared her throat, causing him to swivel around in surprise.

"Hey," she murmured.

"Hey," he responded. They stood there at odds for a moment before Jack shook his head. "Sorry, I was a little distracted. Hanna had…"

"A ballet recital," Samantha finished. "You told me about it last week." She shifted her weight and tossed her hair over her shoulder. "So we're driving to Virginia?"

Jack nodded somberly. "Pack an overnight bag. We could be a while." Sam looked up, paling slightly. She was ready for a few hours of isolation with him, but the prospect of several days scared her. She might explode with the disease of her secret spreading through her veins without telling him. "Are you alright?"

She wanted to shoot the next person who asked her that. Sam hitched a smile onto her lips. "Yeah, everything's fine. I'm sorry about this morning. Things were just a little out of control." He didn't press her, although he wanted to. _Detachment_. Sam headed towards the door. "I'll pack up some things and be back at the office around two, alright?"

"Fine," Jack answered sitting back down. "We'll leave at two thirty." She stepped over the threshold painfully. "Oh, and Sam?" Sam hopefully stuck her head back inside the doorway. "Will you send Vivian in here for a moment? Thanks." He set back to his work and Samantha stared at him, dangerously close to tears.

"Sure," she whispered.

**1:31. The Cornerstone Cafe**

Martin sat at their booth, reviewing the contents of the menu that had remained the same for the last forty years. Sam had called him about fifteen minutes ago to meet her at the Stone for a quick lunch. He ordered himself a milkshake and a root beer, her favorite. He looked up when the glass door swung open to admit Samantha, hair swirling around her head like a golden halo. She found him and quickly slid into the seat.

"Sorry I'm late," she apologized, pecking him on the cheek and removing her jacket. Sam glanced at the drink before her. "Iced tea?" Martin frowned.

"Root beer," he said confusedly. She smiled awkwardly and took a quick sip. A subtle wave of nausea spread over her as the liquid touched her tongue. She couldn't do it. Samantha froze and lifted her hand to her abdomen, a feeling of realization clearing her thoughts and muddling them more at the same time. "I thought you loved root beer."

"Stomachache," she threw at him offhandedly. "Listen, Martin, I wanted to let you know I'll be out of town for a few days. I'm going to Virginia with Jack to check out Mrs. Romero's former rehab center for some leads. I'll have my cell phone so you can call me if you need me." Martin was staring at her blankly. "What?" Sam snapped a bit harsher than she had intended.

"Nothing," he muttered. God, she wanted to tell him. She wanted someone to know, someone beside Vivian. A heavyset waitress took their orders (a double cheeseburger for Martin and a fruit salad for Sam which earned her strange looks from both her boyfriend and the waitress), and left them alone. "Fruit salad? You really must be getting sick." Was he that oblivious to this stranger which had replaced Sam? This stranger eating fruit salad? Not touching root beer? Wasn't the word 'PREGNANCY' flashing across his mind? What the hell was the matter with him?

"So when are you leaving?"

"What the hell is the matter with you?"

Martin's eyes widened in surprise, and Sam held her fingertips to her lips. Had she said that, or were her thoughts so loud inside her head that they echoed in her ears? From the confused expression on Martin's face, she apparently had said them.

"Okay, then…?" Sam put her head in her hands and sighed.

"I didn't mean to say that," she tried to explain, but she honestly was too tired to become angry with him and to frustrated to apologize. "I'm just thinking about a lot of things lately. It didn't mean anything." Martin nodded cautiously and took her hand in his. Samantha squirmed. It was hot and moist because of the humidity of early spring that swirled around them.

The food arrived and she sat back into the firm spine of the booth. They thanked the waitress and accepted the check before beginning to eat. Samantha picked out the pineapple and popped several grapes and strawberries into her mouth, watching Martin's cheeseburger melt all over his fingers. Her eyes sought out the old-fashioned clock. 1:50. She needed to leave soon. _Tell him now. Tell him. Just tell him and leave. Easy get away, just smile, tell him about the child growing inside you, and set down four dollars for the tip. _

"You should get going, shouldn't you?" Martin checked his watch, and wiped his ketchup-stained mouth. "Jack hates to wait, if I know him at all." _Oh, for Christ's sake, Martin, could you manage just a little envy? Aren't you jealous? Don't you care that your girlfriend is spending three days alone with the man she had an affair with? _

"I hate to leave you by yourself," Samantha squeezed out with deceptive syrup in her voice. Martin swallowed hard and pulled her down to him for a long, mustard-flavored kiss. She resisted the urge to lick her lips and smiled. "Alright then…" _I'M PREGNANT, YOU BASTARD! PREGNANT! _"Take care." He nodded and directed his attention back to his burger. She wanted to throw the take-out fruit at him, especially the vile pineapple, but instead she flew out of the doors and walked the two blocks from the Stone to the office.


	4. Chapter 4

**Author's Note: **Well, finally, I've got some time to write. I've been out of state/country on business lately and work's been a killer. So if you think this chapter's a little off, I apologize. Anyway, I'm happy with bits and pieces of it, so enjoy. I appreciate all the feedback I've gotten. Thanks.

**Chapter 4**

**2:34. **

Jack was waiting for her when she returned to the office, sipping what had to be his fourth cup of coffee that day with his coat draped over his arm. When he saw her, he downed the rest of the contents and threw the cup into the trash.

"Hey," he called, his voice a little more hoarse than usual. "Are you ready?"

"Yeah, my bags are downstairs in the lobby."

"Okay, good. Then I guess we're off." He locked the door to his office and swiveled around to face

Vivian's cubicle. "We'll be back Monday, alright Viv?"

She smiled and waved as Jack turned and headed toward the elevator. Sam held her gaze ab it longer, her eyes solemn and fearful at the same time. Vivian's mouth parted as if she were about to say something, but instead she closed her lips and smiled gently.

"Have a nice trip." Sam nodded and turned off her computer on her desk. Jack held the elevator door tolerantly and waited for her. Vivian watched her leave and was tempted to wonder about the circumstances which were before them all, but instead focused on the two sisters and finding them alive and well.

They said nothing in the elevator as it descended six floors before walking silently to Jack's car, a black Nissan. He unlocked the trunk of the car and they piled their things on top of one another. She grabbed a small duffel bag from her things and unconsciously picked up Jack's briefcase which never left his side. He took it from her without question and they slid onto their leather seats.

It had been a longtime since she'd been in this car. In fact, the very last time she could remember was when he broke off the affair a month or so ago. She felt the side of the seat where there was a familiar leather strap which she had gripped and squeezed for support as he delivered the most convincing "I'm-sorry-but-it's-not-going-to-work-out" speech she'd ever heard. The seams were still frayed from when she'd pulled to hard at the very end.

"Are you ready?" She nodded, and he handed her his copy of the case file to hold. "Let's go."

He pulled out of the parking lot and headed for the Brooklyn-Queens Expressway, aware of the frown which crossed Sam's face. "We're going to fly down to Virginia, instead of drive. I figured it would just be easier and wouldn't waste so much time."

"I don't have a ticket…" He pulled a white and blue envelope from behind his overhead visor and handed it to her. In cursive letters were the words _LaGuardia Airport _and_ Air Tran._ "Um, thanks."

"You're welcome."

"I'll pay you when we get back."

"Don't worry about it," he said, shifting to the right-hand side of the road. Sam looked up at him. "I charged it to the FBI financial expense account."

"Oh."

They arrived after fifteen minutes of acomfortable silence, which surprised Samantha. If they could survive the whole trip in the comfort of that silence, she'd be the luckiest woman alive. Jack helped her with her bags and they checked their luggage at the front desks. They flashed their badges humbly to the airline employees and toted their carry-on bags under their arms. A security guard patted them down away from the crowds in order to keep their guns under wraps. He directed them to their correct gate where they walked without rushing. Forty-five minutes early, they sat in the café located fifty-feet away from the boarding gate and quietly drank iced tea and coffee.

The silence Samantha had embraced ended. "Sam, I get that you want some space, but I'm not going to ignore that there's something going on with you." She chugged her iced tea, eyes focused on the lemon submerged at the bottom of the glass. "You're not yourself."

_Yeah, and what makes you think you know about 'myself'?_ She wanted to snap sarcastically, but realized the stupidity of her remark. For six months, they (thought) they knew everything there was to know about one another. All of a sudden, were they supposed to become strangers?

"I'm…" she began, but trailed off. _Not now. I can't do this now._ "I'll be okay. I haven't been feeling the best lately." Jack watched her for a while longer before nodding. "How did Hanna's ballet recital go?"

Jack smiled into his coffee and took a quick swig. "Her partner came in too early and they had to run offstage and start their routine over again," he said with a doleful grin. The fatherly pride betrayed himself on his tired face. He was always tired, and the six or seven cups of coffee a day had little effect on him. Except for when those two were around him. It was like he had been sleeping and suddenly they woke him up into a new man. "But they finished to a standing ovation of parents and grandparents."

"I'm sure she looked beautiful."

"She did." Sam looked outside the café window at the plances taking off and landing, sliding her hand uneasily to her abdomen. It had become a habit of hers, to hold her stomach like that, ever since she found out two weeks earlier. She watched Jack's face just then and suddenly wanted his pride for herself, wanted the doting father and all the rest of the complete American dream he almost had.

"You ever been to Winchester?" He asked her absently, leaning back in his chair and checking his watch to be safe. She shook her head and he nodded. "You'll like it. Trees everywhere, stone fences, two…three hundred year old farms…"

"So what's the name of the rehab center we're looking for?" Sam interrupted, clearing her throat. Jack closed his eyes briefly and sighed. He opened his briefcase and took out the case file, checking the references.

"St. Joseph's House of Rest." Sam raised her eyebrows and nodded, writing something down in her small leatherbound notebook.

"Big Catholic family, I take it," she murmured. "Does she have any family remaining in Virginia?" Jack scrunched his eyebrows in concentration and looked down the case file for more information before shutting it firmly.

"This is not what I want to be thinking about now," he told her simply. Sam had no choice but to accept, and put her notebook into her bag. A subtle rumbling outside the airport startled her. It was no airplane engine. "Thunder."

"Yeah, I heard it, too." She shuddered and took a deep swallow of iced tea. "Are we going to still fly through it? I mean, is it safe?" Jack opened his eyes and glanced at her mildly surprised.

"We'll be fine, Sam," he assured her, placing his hand on the surface of their table. "Don't worry." It's presence there caused her stomach to twist. Whether it was from the underlying reminder of what they had or the growing life she had yet to accept in her stomach, she wasn't sure.

The loudspeaker echoed throughout the airport and informed them that their flight was boarding seats A20 through A12. Sam checked her ticket. A19. Jack stood up, too, and they both paid for their drinks separately. He took up his briefcase and she grabbed her duffel and they hurried over to the line growing beside the young man accepting boarding passes.

Jack led her through the connecting tunnel leading to the plane and shifted his briefcase to his left hand so that he could kiss his right fingers. Before stepping inside the body of the plane, he placed the kissed fingers on the creamy white outside metal and then passed through the gate. Sam almost smiled and tentatively did the same, placing her fingers in a distinctly different place than his.

He was already shrugging off his coat and folding it into the overhead compartment when she made her way down the aisle to their seats, right by the wings. He held his hand out for hers without facing her and she quickly struggled out of her coat and handed it to him. Jack slammed the compartment shut and waited for her to step inside to the window seat. Sam was taken for surprise, considering Jack hated the aisle seat, and slid into her place. He settled into his seat and they both buckled their seat belts.

"Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen," the PA crackled above them as a fresh stream of cold oxygen billowed above their heads. "This is your captain speaking. We'd like to take this chance to thank you for flying _Air Tran_ and ask that at this time you would secure your seat belts so that we can prepare for takeoff. Flight attendants, please take your places at the rear and middle of the plane." The flight attendants, who had been demonstrating the uniform safety procedures, hurried to their places out of sight of the passengers. Sam glanced outside of the window at the steadily graying sky, and drummed her fingers nervously on her upper lip.

"We will be experiencing a bit of turbulence today as we fly over Massachusets and Maryland because of a slight electrical storm coming north from Virginia," the PA added nonchalantly, but Sam blinked her eyes shut rapidly. She hated flying through storms. "So please keep your seat belts fastened until the 'fasten seat belt' sign above you has darkened. Thank you, and enjoy your flight."

Unbeknownst, she hoped, to Jack, a flurry of unexpected thoughts ran through her mind. What if a lightning bolt struck the wing? She was sure she'd heard somewhere that the wing was usually struck first, and they were sitting right by the wings. Would the turbulence cause the engine to fail? Where were the emergency exits? Was it the bottom of the seat which became a floatation device, or the back? Suddenly, a new concern struck her. _What about the baby?_ Her unoccupied other hand held her stomach possessively.

"Hey," Jack interrupted her thoughts and she turned to him anxiously. "It's alright. We're going to be fine. Don't think about it; there's nothing to worry about." She nodded into his eyes and sighed as the plane slowly detached from the airport and made its path to the waiting runway.

Sam suddenly thought of Martin, and smiled. He'd made her breakfast this morning before work. To her surprise, he was a very adept cook, and made her eggs benedict (though they were far from being her favorite) with a fruit salad and bacon. He'd woken her up with a cup of coffee with way too much cream and sugar, but insisted she'd stay in bed while he served her on a wooden tray. Martin was good to her. Her mother told her so many times that she needed someone who was good to her, and Martin was that person. Especially after the psychological trauma the affair had wrought.

The plane lurched forward, gaining speed, and all thoughts of Martin vanished. She clenched her handrest in a death grip and swallowed. Flying never had affected her like this before. She wondered if it was the—her mouth went dry—pregnancy. As if on cue, Jack opened up his fingers beside hers in a silent offer, and not caring what signals she might send, she grabbed it tightly and squeezed. She kept squeezing until they were safely off of the ground, and kept right on squeezing until they passed the first bout of turbulence from the low-lying stratus clouds. She dared a look outside into the sea of gray and white and exhaled slowly. Then, she let go of Jack's hand.

"Thanks," she whispered quietly. He nodded, but didn't face her. He didn't trust the storm which brewed in his own eyes. They settled into a silence which was by no means as comfortable as the one she had salvaged en route to the airport. Yes, Sam was almost positive that that security had vanished as soon as the wheels had left New York ground.


	5. Chapter 5

When they arrived in the Richmond airport, they collected their luggage and found the rental car Jack had requested waiting in the lot outside. Although their flight was only two hours, Sam became quickly sedated by the thick humidity and relaxed atmosphere of the Southern state, and fell asleep in the car as soon as Jack pulled out of the lot. She didn't see Jack's sideways glances as they drove the four hours north to Winchester, nor did she see him tune the radio to a quiet, cackling folk station that, although he despised, he knew she loved.

Her dreams were brief and blurred together in a mess of cryptic images and scenes that her mind was too weary to interpret. When Samantha's eyes fluttered open, it was dark and the headlights illuminated a solitary road and looming trees that reached for her on both sides. Her ears recognized the soft, acoustic guitar thrumming from the speakers and, smilingand looking up at the unbelievable amount of stars in the sky, realized that she certainly wasn't in New York any more.

Jack saw her stretch out of the corner of his eye and pointed to a mug of coffee in her cup holder.

"Coffee?"

"God, yes." Sam's mouth stretched wide in a yawn before she took a deep sip. "When did we stop?"

"About a half-hour ago. We're about fifteen minutes or so away from the B-&-B."

"B-&-B?"

"Yeah, the nearest hotel was about twenty minutes away from St. Joseph's, so I got something closer." Jack sighed and stared blankly at the road. "It was all I could get a hold of."

"No, it's fine. I can't remember the last time I was in a bed and breakfast…" she murmured without thinking. Jack dropped into silence and the air inside the car grew thick and stale. Her lips froze on the mug and she shut her eyes. Yes, she _could_ remember the last time. It was a month or so ago when they drove upstate for the weekend while Marie was in Chicago with the kids. It felt like thirty years ago instead of thirty days, but the wound was still open and she had bluntly ripped at the scab once again.

"I hate this, Jack."

And as usual he said nothing. She wondered if he would say anything at all when she would tell him about the pregnancy. _When she would tell him. _God, she was going to have to do it soon. _When?_ Later. _How much later?_ Later is the best I can do right now.

So, instead, Samantha delved into the neutral security of work. She flipped open her case file and quickly read over the two daughters' profiles before flipping to Mrs. Romero. _Six month stay at St. Joseph House of Rest. Daughters temporarily placed in custody of aunt. Released in December to transfer to the New York City Rehabilitation Facility. _Samantha underlined "custody of aunt" for further investigation, and then scanned down the rest of the case summary. Her eyebrows rose in surprise.

"Mrs. Romero's record is clean?" Jack stirred out of the expressionless stupor he'd sunken into and nodded.

"I know, it surprised me too," he mumbled. "Technically, she's never been arrested. No possession, no nothing. The worst she's got is one unpaid illegal parking ticket."

"Then how was she forced into St. Joseph's? It says 'involuntary admission.'" Jack's jaw clenched for a moment before he spoke.

"Her eldest daughter found her passed out on the floor when she over-dosed one night. She called St. Joseph's and drove her mother there herself. Mrs. Romero was still unconscious when her daughter checked her in, so it was recorded as 'involuntary.'"

Sam stared at the picture of the smiling forty-ish woman bitterly, feeling her respect for the woman drop.

"There has to be more incentive besides the discretion of the New York rehab center that would make Mrs. Romero pick up her family and just leave home." Samantha said into her coffee, taking another sip.

"That's what I'm hoping we find out." Jack turned off the highway and onto a smaller road that curved through a patch of woods. The tall trees blocking the moonlight cast long silhouettes on the road and she turned off the handheld light she used to read.

Samantha was quiet as they pulled into the confines of a small, antique village and gazed at the rows and rows of historic buildings that glowed warm from within. Lampposts every block or so barely lit the empty streets, so they drove slowly through the quaint neighborhood. Jack turned onto a side-street and parked the car beside a tall, two story brick building that had to be at least two-hundred years old. A white sign illuminated by two spotlights on the ground was decorated in reminiscent lettering and displayed the words "Starke's Tavern. Circa 1802."

"I didn't think places like this exist anymore," Sam whispered incredibly, and Jack laughed while he unloaded their luggage. "People live here? In these houses?" She glanced at him for confirmation, and he nodded. "It's like I'm walking through a Jane Austen novel!"

"And just think: a junkie and her dealer lived less than a block down the road," Jack whispered cynically in her ear. She closed her half-open mouth and fell hard back to reality. "Makes you reconsider what exactly 'places like this' are."

He climbed the brick steps to the walkway without another word and knocked on the front door. Samantha stood by the car, struck with the impact of his words or at least the impact of the impermeable humidity that caused a sheen of sweat to cover her skin even in early March.


	6. Chapter 6

**Author's Note: **I apologize for taking so long to update, but things have been really hectic at work and at homelately and have barely had enough time to eat and sleep let alone write. This chapter's pretty short, but I'm working on a longer one right now.

Also, I had a comment that I was biased towards Martin which is completely untrue. I think he's a great character and treats Samantha well, but if you wanted completely unbiased material, I wouldn't think you'd check out a Jack/Sam story. Nevertheless, the criticism was well noted and I'm trying to involve him more in the upcoming chapters. Thanks!

* * *

Samantha took the key to her room from Jack as soon as he'd registered, and, with the defense that she was really tired, hurried into the sanctuary and locked the door. She had hoped that the alone time with Jack this weekend would give her time to talk about…things, but all the trip had done in the last ten hours was give her a neck-full of tension and a throbbing headache.

She unpacked some of her clothes into the complimentary dresser and sat down on the queen-sized bed, lying back on the soft mattress. A lamp by her bedside table cast a warm glow on the walls and provided a welcoming atmosphere. Samantha's eyes stared at the in-room telephone and she turned over on her stomach to check the time. 11:23. Digging deep in her coat pockets for her cell phone, she dialed a ten-digit number and waited.

A groggy voice crackled on the other end of the line.

"Hello?" Sam smiled at Martin's sleep-laden voice and tucked a pillow under her chin. "Sam, is that you?"

"Yeah, it's me. I just got into the hotel a few minutes ago." She heard Martin clear his throat and cough loudly. "I didn't mean to wake you up…I wanted to let you know."

"No, no, I'm glad you called," he said, more awake now. "Miss you."

Sam felt an unexpected pang of guilt mixed with something she couldn't identify and swallowed. "I miss you too, babe." She listened to the rain starting to fall outside and grew very serious. "Martin, I need to talk to you about something."

"Is something wrong?" The concern in his voice was clear and she closed her eyes. "Are you all right?"

"I'm fine," she sighed, turning over on her back. She wondered how much harder this would be if she was talking to him face to face. "I know we decided not to talk about this kind of thing, but…"

"What's going on, Sam?" Martin asked gently. She rubbed her forehead and scrunched her features together.

"Do you want marriage, Martin?" The line went quiet on both ends, and she wasn't sure whether she actually wanted that silence to break. Sam prayed he wouldn't take the passive stand and give her the expected _I-want-whatever-you-want_ reply. She heard Martin's steady, collected breathing on the other end, which calmed her.

"Yes, Sam. I do," he answered after a while. She felt her stomach churning inside of her and placed a nervous hand on her abdomen. "But the last thing I want is to pressure you into something you're not ready for or something…something you don't want."

"Okay," she whispered softly. "Okay…" They said nothing for a while as the rain spattered against the glass windowpanes and slid down in serpentine patterns.

"Do you want to talk about it?"

"No, it's all right. I should get some sleep tonight," Sam murmured, keeping her voice strong. She turned the phone over in her hands to turn it off, but hesitated and raised it back up to her ear. "Martin?"

"Yeah, Sam?"

"I'm pregnant."

She nailed her thumb against the power button and held the phone tightly against her chest. Her eyes were wide and she tucked her legs close to her chest in a fetal position. She couldn't remember when her consciousness ebbed and sleep took over.


	7. Chapter 7

**Author's Note:** After much, _much_ delay, I've finally got something up. Things will definitely start rolling now in regards to how fast I update things. I'm between jobs right now and it's hard to get a lot of free time to just write. Especially as my temperamental laptop has its own schedule of when it decides to allow me to work wireless or not.

Anyway, I'm having a lot of trouble deciding the outcome of this story. Whose baby is it? Who will Sam end up with? What will she do when it's born? Hmm. Lots of decisions coming my way.

But, that's my problem. Enjoy what I've got so far! And thanks again for everyone's patience.

* * *

**Chapter 8**

Jack woke the next morning to a horrible retching sound in the next room. He rubbed his eyes with the heels of his hand and quickly fumbled with the door to wrench it open. Leaving it ajar, he hurried to Samantha's door and leaned his head against it; the awful sound grew louder and was obviously coming from inside.

"Sam?" He called in a restrained voice. "Hey, Sam, open the door a minute, will you?" He heard her cough and gag before footsteps thundered to the door and she swung it open. "Jesus…"

She looked a mess. Her hair stuck out at oddly angled tufts and dark bags hung under her eyes. She stared up at him with a dead stare before her eyes widened and she ran from the doorway and lunged herself at the bathroom. The retching sound made him cringe, but he stepped inside the room and shut the door.

He found her hunched over the toilet seat, her elbow propped on the roll of tissue while her hand supported her forehead. Jack reached for a washcloth and ran cold water over it until it was saturated and its surface cooled. He squatted down next to her, and leaned her back against the wall, placing the cloth on her forehead.

Sam whimpered in protest but did not stop his efforts. "Relax, it's okay. I've had two kids; I've seen this sort of thing before." Sam looked at him in horror before her face crumpled. "Okay, okay, bad joke, I'm sorry."

She took over control of the towel and let him lean back on his heels. "Ginger ale," she mumbled. "Saltines…" Jack nodded and located the mini bar by the TV monitor. He grabbed to bottles of the soda and searched for the crackers. "In my duffel bag," she croaked from the bathroom floor, and he found them immediately.

"Here you go," Jack murmured, lowering himself back down to her spot on the floor and unscrewing the bottle cap. She weakly thanked him and took a careful sip from the green bottle. "Why didn't you tell me you were coming down with something? I would have had Viv come down with me, or Danny."

Sam shrugged and took a bite of the saltine he offered. "I guess it was one of those twenty-four-hour viruses." He watched her skeptically as she chewed. "Will you run the hot water in the bathtub and plug the drain? I think I'll try and take a bath before we head out to the rehab center."

"I can go on my own if you don't feel up—"

"Just run the goddamn bath, Jack." Sam glared at him with what little strength she had and he relented. "I'll be ready in a few." After he left she leaned her head back against the wall and breathed in the steam the hot running water produced. Morning sickness, she thought dismally. Wonderful.

As she soaked in the ceramic tub, she closed her eyes and thought of the phone call she'd made only six hours ago and of how the person she'd called was reacting six hours later. The hand held was on the sink counter less than a foot away. It seemed more like a mile. Flicking the soapy water from her fingers, she stretched to reach it and grabbed the phone to her body. She paused, and dialed a number. He answered on the second ring.

"Malone."

"Jack? Listen, I'm sorry, I don't think I'm up to going out there…"

"Fine, I understand," he interrupted gently. "I'll call you around eleven and give a report of anything I find. Just take it easy, all right?"

"Yeah, I will. Thanks," she said, her throat beginning to constrict. "Good luck." Sam hung up the phone and placed it back on the sink counter before submerging herself completely underwater.

* * *

Forty-five minutes later she was sitting on her still unmade bed, wrapped in a terrycloth robe with her hair bound by a towel on her head. She was applying lotion to her dry legs and feeling guilty about missing the visit to the rehab center in Winchester, although she knew she wouldn't have made fifteen minutes before feeling sick to her stomach again. She looked down at her stomach. The idea of pregnancy was still foreign to her, but the realization that something was changing inside of her was beginning to actualize.

_She was going to have to tell him._ She had already applied for a paternity test because the whirlwind month in which the baby was conceived left her confused and uncertain. She needed to get DNA samples from both of them, but how the hell was she supposed to ask for something like that? _Um, yeah, Martin? Could I have a sample of your sperm for a quickie DNA test? You see, I'm not quite sure whose child I'm carrying and I thought I might want to find out… _She smirked and fell back against the rumpled bed sheets.

_Jack, not that our already complicated beyond belief relationship could become anymore so, but I may or may not be having your baby; care to donate some sperm to find out?_

She could already see his expression in her head.

"I gotta get out of here," she murmured to herself, staring up at the oddly patterned ceiling. So, a few minutes later, she threw on some semi-casual clothes, contemplated her appearance in the mirror (as well as what she'd look like with an engorged abdomen several months from now), and strode coolly out the door.

After she'd descended the stairs to the lobby, she looked to where a plump woman of about forty sat at a Victorian-esque couch with a mug of coffee in her hand. The woman glanced up when she heard Sam clear her throat.

"Good morning," she said brightly. "Would you like some breakfast?" Sam shook her head no and declined. The woman sighed and got to her feet. "Neither did your husband. You Yankees should learn to eat better; notice birds like me live longer with food in my stomach."

"He's not my husband," Sam corrected, but the woman didn't hear her. "Anyway, I was wondering if there was some sort of map or anything of the town that I could have?"

"Front porch on the left as your leaving," the woman called, picking up a piece of dark bacon and munching on it. "There's a list of sights and historical buildings, if you like that sort of thing."

"Thank you," Sam replied, when in truth all she wanted was a walk in which she wouldn't get lost. As the woman said, a stack of maps was waiting for her on the front porch and she took one hastily before flinging herself outdoors.

It was cold, and so she stuffed her arms into a long, wool sweater-jacket her mother made her two Christmases ago. The air was thick and damp with early morning dew and fog that smelled so sweet she opened her mouth to taste it. She suddenly realized how Jack meant when he described this place to her. It was beautiful in a way that its beauty was untouched by modern industry and sound pollution.

She sighed just to break the silence. Sam squinted and saw a square brick building with a painted sign hanging over the entrance. From the plate and silverware portrayed on the black surface, she took it to be a nostalgic restaurant from the eighteenth century, and with a smile, fed her secret passion for history.

A bell on the front door chimed against the glass as she entered. Sam looked around at the warm interior and smiled to herself. A fire was beginning to liven in a large brick fireplace and wide-paneled wooden floor stretched on either side of her, supporting reminiscent tables and chairs as well as a built in bench beneath the front two windows. It was quaint, homey, and made her simply want to melt into a puddle.

_Why would someone ever leave here?_ She thought mindlessly, her thoughts of Mrs. Romero.

"Ma'am, can I get you a table?" Sam looked up into the eyes of a middle-aged woman with a black apron around her hips.

"Could I—is that seat by the fire available?" The woman smiled and set a menu and silverware at the table Sam indicated. "Thanks. The fire looks great."

"Everyone loves this seat. D'you know, George Washington used to come into this very restaurant every morning for breakfast in the late 1700s or so? He used to sit in this very spot." The waitress looked nostalgically at the chair Sam now occupied as if she could remember the famed customer. "And, Stonewall Jackson saved this place from being burned to the ground in the Civil War."

"No kidding?" Sam said in disbelief, and the woman nodded blankly. "This is quite a place." The waitress chuckled and took out an order book.

"Not from around here, then?" she asked patiently.

"New York," Sam admitted, scanning the leather menu. "I'm investigating a missing person's case for the city." From the corner of her eye, she saw the woman's smile falter.

"Who is it you're looking for?" Sam looked up and was surprised to see the woman's face had lost its glow and was now almost pale.

"Two girls," Sam replied, lowering her menu. "Rebecca and Isabel Romero." The woman blanched and grabbed onto the chair opposite Samantha. "Did you—did you know them?"

"Know them?" The waitress sighed looking sadly into Sam's wide eyes. "I was their aunt." Samantha dropped her menu on the table, suddenly losing her ravenous appetite. "And their crackpot mother was my sister."

"If I could ask you some questions, Mrs…?"

"Davis. You can call me Sue."

"Sue, if I could talk to you about the girls and Mrs. Romero, it would benefit the case immensely." Suddenly Sam was out of introverted, newly maternal instinct and in her baggy sweater and jeans, she was the composed professional from New York, investigating a case.

Sue sniffed and looked up as a couple entered the small tavern, waved, and moved to a vacant table. "I don't know how much I can help, missy; Eliza kept people out of her life and her children's. Even to her relatives."

Sam took the woman's hand which was trembling ever so slightly. "Anything will help, Mrs. Davis." Sue looked into Sam's eyes and nodded after exhaling slowly.

"I'll do what I can. Let me get the Greene's their coffee. They're here every morning." She stood up and smiled at her customer as if nothing had happen out of the ordinary. "Would you like some tea, missy?"

Sam nodded with a brief smile before digging in the knit purse she'd brought with her for a pad and pen. There were a few sheets of crumpled paper on the very bottom and a colored pencil. It would have to do.

* * *

**Author's Note:** Well, there you have it. Nothing too eventful, I know, but it'sa transition period. All reviews, critiques, flames are welcome...hopefully constructive. Thanks for your patience and interest. --LV :-)


	8. Chapter 8

**Author's Note**: Finally updated! I was so caught up with finishing Mariel3's story, _Too Good To Be True_, I got distracted. (a GREAT read, if you haven't already) All right, hope everyone enjoys. I'm over this block of uncertainty I'd been stuck on in reference to what I was going to do with the storyline, but everything's resolved, my outline is finally drafted, and all I have to do now is get it down on paper. Thanks for all the support.

* * *

Jack sat across a scratched mahogany desk from a man in his early fifties wearing a white lab coat and rectangular, rimless bifocals. The president of St. Joseph's watched as the FBI agent flipped through the slim vanilla folder containing Mrs. Grace Romero's file before clearing his throat gruffly.

"If there's anything else I can do," the president added as they rose simultaneously. Jack nodded and offered him his card.

"Thanks for your cooperation," he mumbled, obviously thinking of something else. "My personal line's on the back." Jack looked down at the surprisingly thin folder and shook his head. "You're sure this is all the history you have of Mrs. Romero's duration here? Six months is quite a bit of time…"

"Like I said, Mrs. Romero was the ideal patient," the doctor answered with a shrug. "Never gave us any trouble, just typical withdrawal behavior. That's why there was such little fuss over her transfer to New York."

They fell silent for a moment before Jack stretched out his hand. The president shook it firmly once. "Best of luck, Mr. Malone. Mrs. Romero and her childrens' safety is the first thing on all of our minds."

"Of course," Jack responded and withdrew his hand after another second. "We'll be in touch."

As soon as he left the office and walked down an ashy-white hallway to the main lobby, Jack exhaled deeply and tucked the file under his arm. Someone wasn't coming clean, and he hated being led on. When it came to endangered lives, he was not a patient man. Just as he was about to flip open his cell phone to call Samantha's hotel room to check in, a voice called him from behind.

"Mr. Malone!" Jack turned and frowned to see someone running toward him in the distance. The figure morphed into a young medical assistant whom Jack vaguely remembered greeting earlier that morning. "I waited until you were outside the walls before coming up to you, sorry. You never know who's listening until you're fired a week later for opening your mouth."

"Why would you be fired?" Jack asked, his eyes lowering to a battered briefcase in the man's left hand. "What's that?"

"That would be why I'd be fired," the young man answered sheepishly. "I told them you'd left your briefcase. Inside, I put Mrs. Romero's file—her _real_ file—behind the leather backing." Jack looked up, scrutinizing the doctor's character. "There's some stuff the president wouldn't want getting out, but I'm more concerned with Grace's life than some fake pretense."

"I'll take a look at it," the FBI agent said, smoothly relieving the man of his burden. "Should I—do you want my card?"

The doctor shook his head, already backing away. "No, no, I think I'm as involved as I want to be, Mr. Malone. But thanks." He paused briefly. "Just—be careful with her. She's not what people think she is."

Jack slunk back into his car and slammed the door shut, sliding the briefcase under the passenger side seat. It would be too dangerous to investigate it now. Instead, he tossed the thin file on the backseat and took out his cell phone again. His thumb hovered over Sam's speed dial button before switching to a different number. Plugging the phone into the outlet at the lighter, he hit the speaker button and pulled out of the driveway.

"This is Johnson."

"Hey, Viv. It's Jack. How's it going?" He spared the small talk; Vivian would understand his abruptness.

"Okay, we've got about three eyewitnesses from Central Park who saw the girls and a large dog late Saturday around midnight. The blonde girl, Jessica, seemed to be hunched over her stomach, but they were almost running and so no one stopped them."

Jack recorded mental notes. "Did we get anything off of the Dominican Academy?"

"Well, the teachers had nothing but good things to say about the girls, even Tallulah, the younger one, who we all thought was a trouble-maker. Jessica's boyfriend hangs around a lot, but so do the boyfriends of all the other girls who go there."

"What do we know about him?

"Jeremy? Quiet, kind of sulky. Seems like a shady character, but Martin checked his record when he picked him for marijuana possession and other than that, he's clean."

"Uh-huh," Jack murmured.

"You don't sound convinced." He smirked.

"I'm not. What about Mrs. Romero? She give us anything worthwhile about her situation?" He heard Viv sigh through the line.

"Just sputtering and crying about her babies," Vivian answered. "I don't know, Jack. She seems to be taking it pretty hard. Almost like she's feeling guilty."

"Could she be trafficking?"

"Drugs? I don't know. Danny's questioning her now and Martin drove down to the rehab center to see what her status is like right now." Vivian paused. "Samantha with you?"

"Uh, no, she's sick."

"Sick?"

"You know, throwing up, fever, headache…" Jack squinted through a light drizzle that had begun to fall and flicked on the windshield wipers. "I feel bad dragging her down here. If I'd known she was coming down with something…"

"She'll be fine. She's tough." There was a heavy silence as the rain interrupted their connection slightly. "How about you, are you doing all—" Vivian was cut off by Jack's sudden yell and swearing as she heard breaks screeching and a horn blare. "Jack? Jack! Can you hear me?"

"Son of a bitch…" Her boss muttered moments later, "Some idiot just sped out of a garage and nearly hit me head on! God, and people say New Yorkers can't drive."

Vivian laughed nervously. "Right. Be careful, Jack. We'll call you if we get an update."

He hung up the phone and got out of the car, not bothering to grab his umbrella, and went to the front of the car to check for damage. He'd veered into the open garage to avoid the lunatic who almost hit him, and if he had to pay two-hundred bucks if he'd blown a tire or the headlight was busted…

Jack turned suddenly from the car and glanced into the open lean-to garage that he'd pulled into with a crumpled brow. The hairs on the back of his neck bristled. He was not a superstitious man by any means, but he trusted whatever supernatural force controlled the sparse hair along the very top of his spine with his life. It was hardly ever anything but spot-on.

His hand moved to the holster at his hip, but instead he grabbed the flashlight from the front seat and walked into the garage, rain splattering against the aluminum roof. The garage was shadowed against the already cloudy sky, but Jack could see several rusted cabinets and chests upon which were piled greasy out-of-use tools and forgotten car parts. But something was grabbing at him, and he could not turn back just yet.

Jack knelt by one of the locked cabinets and examined the thoroughly rusted exterior. His eyes traveled along the porous surface until they came to the padlock binding the doors shut. Brow creased further, he frowned. For such a destroyed remnant, the lock was surprisingly new and heavy-duty, as was the chain on the adjacent chest, and the next. He held out a finger to test the lock.

"Put the flashlight on the cabinet and your holster at your feet." Jack froze and felt his stomach churn within him. The cold, unflinching mouth of a pistol pressed against the back of his neck. "Put the flashlight on the cabinet and your holster at your feet." Jack's mind spun. "I won't say it again, Mr. Malone."

Jack placed his flashlight head up on the cabinet so that a spotlight shone on the mildewy ceiling and slowly unhitched his holster. What were his exits? Where was his pocket knife? How did the man know him? What were his options? His mind was a flurry of trained responses, but the mouth of the gun was insistent and so he shook the thoughts temporarily away.

"Very good. Now, get up." Jack rose to his feet, wincing as his weather-sensitive knee pulled against a tender muscle. He turned around. "Brazen, Mr. Malone. I didn't ask to see your face."

"What do you want?" Jack murmured, his voice calm and level. Beyond the gun, he could see the face of a seventeen-year-old boy with messy black hair and a much pierced face. The boy could tell the agent recognized him.

"Remember me now, Mr. Malone?"

"Where are the girls, Jeremy?" Jack listened to the wheezing laugh that followed and was confronted with a closer view of the handgun.

"They're just fine," Jeremy answered, pushing Jack backwards against a misshapen metal door that he kicked open. "But let's not get to the exciting part just yet, shall we? Now, would you please go through this door and have a seat." The boy yanked on a hanging cord connected to a filthy light bulb and lit the room dimly. Several wooden chairs were assembled around crates doubling as tables were glass plates and bags of white powder were splayed open, their contents spilling onto the surface.

"Jeremy, listen to me…" The boy struck Jack hard across the forehead with the butt of his gun and Jack stumbled into the room, seeing stars.

"Shut up and sit down." Blinking away the black dots from his vision and realizing he had no other choice, he slumped down into a wooden chair. Only then did he realize he was not alone.

* * *

**Yes, cruel cliffhanger, isn't it? Haha, sorry. Will not be as lazy with follow-up, though. I promise. -LV**


	9. Chapter 9

**Author's Note: **I was really relieved that I found a new direcetion to turn this story in because I was getting a little frustrated before I posted Ch. 9. But now, at what I'd like to call the half-way mark of this story (tentatively, of course), I've got a plan, or at least a _hint_of a plan, to work with. Thanks for the support thus far, and I hope everyone enjoys this and new chapters to come. Broke the 2-digit boundary! Whoo-hoo! ;-)**

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Chapter 10**

Samantha's pen scribbled madly across the stained notepad as the Sue spoke in hushed tones of her wayward sister. Though her stomach churned and the nausea broke upon her in steady waves, she wrote on, barely needed to ask questions to keep the woman going.

"I guess the addiction really started with our parents," Sue said, smiling at an elderly couple that just passed through the diner front door. "My mother formed an addiction to pain killers when she was on them for her cancer, and seeing her like that really sculpted my sister's personality. Not to say she had an excuse, because there isn't one for the way she treated those kids." The couple sat down and waited for menus. "'Scuse me, darlin', my regulars are waiting. And drink your tea! You haven't even touched it!"

Sam paused and stretched her cramped fingers around a still-warm coffee mug. She smiled. And Jack thought she was curled up in a miserable mess back at the hotel room. What a surprise he'd get when she showed him…

Sue was back, bearing a second tea bag and new hot water. "Sorry, where did I leave off?"

"Mrs. Romero's treatment of her children---"

"Yes, it was terrible. They had a hurricane of a mother—one day as calm and cool as the eye of a storm, the next turbulent and angry and sometimes violent," Sue bit on the cap of her pen and looked at Samantha thoughtfully. "At one point (this would be about five or six years ago), my sister stopped takin' and started dealing. I'm not sure which one was worse. It was as if she'd taken on the addiction of every druggie within a fifty-mile radius. When their demands grew, her temper shortened. When her stock was low, her patience was low. But things really went downhill when Rick died—"

"Rick?"

"Grace's husband…the girls' dad. He died three years ago in a 'car accident' up in D.C…" Sue hesitated. "Agent Spade, you and I both know there was no car accident. Truth was Grace was slow on her delivery rate and some clients got angry and killed her husband as a warning." Samantha looked up, not even wanting to imagine what those girls had been through. "Anyway, she wanted out of Winchester as soon as possible so she up and took my babies to New York and enrolled them in some fancy Catholic school."

"The Dominican Academy," Samantha murmured, and began to jot down something else when her phone rang. She smiled ruefully at Sue and swiveled to the side to take the call. "This is Samantha."

"Sam, it's Martin." Her stomach plummeted and she felt her face burn in horror. Now, of all times, he called her… He apparently understood her silence and continued. "Listen, not a big deal, but I just wanted to let you and Jack know that we've released Jeremy Sharpe because his brother bailed him out. I mean, we didn't have that much dirt on him anyway and Vivian couldn't break him last night when she interrogated him, so we let him go."

The nervous rush in Martin's voice that he adopted whenever he was nervous unexplainably pleased Samantha, and she sucked in her breath for a quick boost of strength. "Uh, sure. I'll let Jack know as soon as I see him."

"Where is he?"

"St. Joseph's. I was sick today and just now got out of our—hotel." His line went silent except for a faint static hiss from a poor connection.

"Are you—I mean, you doing all right now?"

She inhaled deeply and put an elbow up on the chair back to support herself. "Yeah, just allergies I guess. I'll call you back later. Oh, and tell Vivian to call me. Please." She hung up without explaining.

Sue was watching her curiously and so Samantha smiled. "Just our office in New York. They released Jessica's boyfriend and wanted to let me know." The wistful waitress had a sad expression in her eyes.

"She always was so popular with the boys," Sue whispered softly. "Oh, please, Agent Spade. Please find my babies! They ain't done nothing wrong, it's their mother who should have been stolen away not—" She clapped her hands over her mouth and looked at Samantha in horror. "Sweet Mary, Mother of God, please forgive me…"

The waitress looked at Samantha imploringly before hurrying off to the backroom to wash her face. Sam watched her disappear, frowning slightly. _Where was Jack_? It was nearly eleven and he hadn't called her. She flipped open her phone and scrolled down to where his name was listed in her address book. Hesitating, Samantha pressed down on the green phone key and held the cell to her ear.

She frowned when he didn't pick up on the second ring, as he had for as long as he'd known her. On the fourth ring, she heard the line click as his phone connected to hers.

"Jack, you won't believe this—"

"Now, let me guess who this could be…let me think, let me think…" Samantha's lips froze as a cold voice made even icier over the hiss of the line. "Agent Spade, isn't it? I've been waiting for your call."

"Who is this?" Sam whispered in a low voice. No answer. "Hello? Who's there? If you're trying—"

"Sam, listen to me." Jack's voice cut her off and her stomach fell suddenly. Something was wrong; _very _wrong. "Don't tell them anything, do you hear me? What ever they say, don't---"

She heard a loud smack and the snide voice returned to the phone, coughing and panting slightly. "Another word like that, Mr. Malone, and it's the last you'll ever make. I'm sure Agent Spade here is smart enough to know what's in everyone's best interests, don't you Samantha?"

"What do you want?" Her voice sounded strange and hollow as held onto the cell phone with trembling fingers.

"I want the aunt. Davis. Tell her to bring my cut, and that if there's even a milligram missing, blood's going to spill. Starting with her darling niece Jessica." Samantha swallowed difficultly.

"I don't know what you're talking about."

The voice grew impatient. "You don't need to; I'm sure Sue will be kind enough to fill you plenty on the way here. You have two hours." _Click_.

Samantha pulled the phone away from her ear, her fingers quivering slightly. She could feel herself starting to panic, the frantic heartbeat against her lungs, the sweat beginning to form on her brow, her face growing warm and flushed. She shook her head firmly and cleared her mind. _Focus_, she thought_, Focus. He's counting on _you_ now. _

Sue returned to the table with a steaming pot of hot water and an affected smile hitched from ear to ear. "Sorry about that, darlin'. More water for your tea?"

Samantha stood, her face as solemn as stone. "All right, Mrs. Davis. You've put my boss in danger as well as both of your nieces, so it's up to you whether you want any of their blood on your hands."

The waitress lowered the coffee pot to the surface of the table, her eyes falling downcast. After a second, they flicked back up to Samantha's with a new and strange expression in them as if they were someone else's eyes completely. "What does he want?"

Samantha blanched. "He? You know who---"

"Of course I do," Ms. Davis snapped. "He's Jessica's boyfriend, Jeremy. The second he found out about my sister's past, he was trying to suck her and her daughters dry for all he could get. When I cut him off a few weeks back with a threat to expose him, he sent me a threat of coming after my family, but I don't have any family. So he moved on to the next best thing."

She looked up from coffee pot handle and glared at Samantha. "There's no point phoning any police, Miss Spade. He'll kill them all if you do." Sue glanced over her shoulder where the manager sat by the counter. "I'll be back in an hour, Greg!" To Samantha she said, "Let's go."

Samantha watched the woman throw down her apron and hurry through the diner's front door, and clenched her jaw. She picked up her coat, threw the paper full of notes into her purse, and ignored the questioning gaze of the alternate waitress, as she'd left not a single penny as a tip.

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**A/N: **Thanks again for reading--I appreciate any feedback and will try to post again soon. --LV 


	10. Chapter 10

**Author's Note:** I want to apologize for how long it has taken to get this chapter up, and it isn't even that long either. I understand if people have moved on from this story, but I haven't stopped thinking about it even if I barely have enough time to sleep. Promise to get something more up soon, since I'm on a roll tonight.

Thanks to everyone who has given me support so far in the fic. It's very much appreciated.

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**Chapter 11 **

Samantha drove like hell down the slick highway, windshield wipers slashing through the rain that poured down around her. In the passenger's seat. Her mind was racing, and it seemed the faster her heart seemed to pound against her chest, the harder her foot pressed against the gas pedal. To her right, Mrs. Davis had her head tilted back against the headrest, fingers drumming along the strap of her purse.

"How much further is this garage?" Samantha demanded abruptly. Mrs. Davis shut her eyes. "Answer me!"

"About a mile more," she sighed. "There's no use hydroplaning off the road, Agent Spade. Killing your boss now won't get him an ounce of what he really wants."

Samantha barely heard her. She fumbled in her pocket for her cell phone and glanced down at the keypad. _Call someone, call someone..._ Sam's fingers trembled noticeably, and she struggled to swallow. Almost ten years of training and suddenly she was a rookie facing the barrel of a gun she couldn't remember how to disarm. Mrs. Davis jerked into an upright position.

"Watch it!" She shrieked, pulling the steering wheel to a sharp right so that Sam swerved back into her lane. A cement truck blared its horn loudly as it sped past her, and Samantha had to stifle a sob. She could feel the tears building up behind her eyes and choking her. _What am I doing?_ she thought as Mrs. Davis berated her from her seat _I can't ... I can't do this on my own_. _What the _hell_ am I supposed to do alone?_

"You've past it." Samantha shook herself and slammed on the breaks. The car went into a fishtale in the middle of the road and made a complete 180 degree turn. Mrs. Davis clutched her purse, and more noticeably, something inside of it. Pulling off the road where an abandoned tin-roofed garage stood, Samantha grabbed the woman's bag and felt inside of it. "What the hell are you..."

"You're carrying a gun...and---and drugs," Samantha breathed, parking by a dumpster. Mrs. Davis stared at her in surprise.

"Well, wouldn't you in this scenario?" The agent paused, fingers hovering above her holster. "What's the plan?"

"You'll stay in this car," Samantha said, suddenly aware of the cold sweat that trickled down her face. Her muscles twitched along her body as she unfastened her seatbelt and stashed the drugs in her pocket. "And call for back-up if you hear gunshots or screaming coming from inside. The number's the last I dialed."

_The last she dialed_. Martin. Last night. This morning. Pregnancy. Samantha pressed a hand against her abdomen and suddenly felt pure, unadulterated fear plummet through herself. _Get a hold of yourself. _

She looked to her right and realized Mrs. Davis was speaking to her. "...all that government efficiency bullshit, and you're terrified when you're not at a desk somewhere typing up reports. And I guess you're just taking it on good faith that I won't drive away and leave you here to die, Agent Spade."

Samantha kicked open the door and stared the woman hard in the eye. "Honestly, Mrs. Davis, I don't give a shit what you do."

She walked through the rain, gun raised in front of her. Her boots sank deeper into the muddy gravel with each step she took. It was happening, as it always did as she approached any situation. Concern for herself and her life retreated in the back of her mind. There was one priority: search and rescue. Protect the victim.

At the warped door that was slammed shut from the inside, she placed her shoulder against the aluminum and listened. She could hear footsteps and coughing and soft sobbing, and suddenly she looked down at her tensed body. Then, Samantha Spade did something she hadn't done in perhaps twelve years or possibly more. She prayed.

_PleasehelpmepleasehelpmepleaseGodplease._

She called out into the rain and identified herself as a federal agent. The blood pounded in her ears.

_Please. Help me. God. Keep me safe._

The coughing was silenced. A crash. And the footsteps came close to the door.

_Keepmesafe...keep him safe...keepmesafe..._

The door opened slowly. She was pulled inside by a force outside her body.

She could not see for the darkness and the stench of sweat and humidity dumbed her senses. The kid stood by a chair, gripping onto it for support. He was rasping, yelling, trying to appear dominant, but she was deaf to him. Her eyes went to the two girls, huddled together, dirty and bruised but not critically injured. And then her eyes fell on him.

He was slumped in a chair, bound by a cord that she could tell cut painfully into his chest. His shirt was torn, and there was a significant stain down the front of it. She felt lightheaded as she comprehended it as blood. _Be okay...be okay..._

The kid pushed himself away from the chair and slumped over to where Jack was. With the hand not occupied by a rusted knife, he grabbed onto her boss's drenched hair and pulled his head back. Samantha felt herself nearly swoon, but squeezed every single muscle in her body to steady herself. His face was ... broken.

"Look-ee, Jack," the kid panted, placing the blade against Jack's cheek. "We've got company..."

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	11. Chapter 11

**Author's Note:** Thanks to everyone who still reads this story, and who was completely honest about forgetting it :-). I'm going to finish this, no matter who ends up finishing it with me, because as hectic as life is right now, this means a lot to me. I know this chapter's brief, but I'm doing my best. Will post more soon. -LV

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**Chapter 12**

Samantha felt fear as if she'd never feared anything before. In her mind flashed images of her past, more specifically mistakes she'd made, regrets she'd harbored for nearly half her life. She felt helpless and weak, and more and more paralyzed by self-doubt by the second. In that moment, Samantha looked through the eyes of the child inside of her and was not herself.

Jeremy was sweating. The hand not holding the blade to Jack's cheek shook while the other was beginning to draw a line of blood across his face. "You got it?"

"Got---got what..." Samantha stammered, eyes wide and focused on somewhere below Jack's face. Even with here eyes were they were, she could see him tense up in disappointment. She was a disappointment: to him, to everyone..._ Pleasehelpme..._

"Don't fuck with me, bitch!" The kid shrieked, pushing the blade harder into Jack's skin. She heard voices softly crying and saw the two sisters by a rusted oil barrel, clinging to each other. Jeremy saw the direction in which she was looking and stumbled over to the girls. "I'll put a bullet through them both, I swear to God!"

"I believe you," Sam whispered, clenching her gun tightly. It seemed the more she did, the harder it was for her to keep the mouth of it steady. "Look, I'm not—" Jeremy's shin collided accidentally with an empty drum of oil and it clanged to the ground. "—I'm not trying to fuck with you, Jeremy. I just…I want to get everybody…keep everything safe."

Sam felt the sweat drip down from her forehead and into her eyes, blurring her already fuzzy vision. Her hands shook, and she only prayed that the kid didn't notice.

"Samantha…?" A deep, hoarse voice penetrated the muddled state of her brain.

"Look, can we just…" she began, automatically breaking the rules of negotiating with a dangerous fugitive. "Just let the girls go…you've got two FBI agents. That's—that's plenty to bargain with…"

"What a brilliant point," Jeremy snapped, his body shaking. "Except for the part where _nobody knows where the _fuck_ we are!" _He leaned and held onto Jessica's shoulder for support. She shrieked. He reacted.

It happened in the span of a second at most. Sam saw the knife descend as in slow motion, cutting through the air in perfect aim at the girl's throat. Samantha struggled to holster her own weapon, heard it clatter to the ground, and dove for the kid.

Jessica's eyes flashed up to the FBI agent's face. Jeremy's followed. The blade switched targets, and it plunged into Samantha's unprotected side.

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_End Ch. 12_


	12. Chapter 12

**Author's Note:** God, do I love days off! Had some time, so typed up the handwritten copy of this chapter I'd been carrying around for like a week. I apologize ahead of time for the typos, and thanks again (I know I'm a little spazzy) for keeping on reading this. Means a lot to me. Enjoy.

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**Chapter 13**

"Jeremy! Jeremy, no! Jeremy!" Jack lunged in his chair and nearly toppled it over. "Jeremy, please stop. Just...just get away from her, please..."

His voice was drowned out by Samantha's scream. He had heard that specific scream only once before, and even then it hadn't carried the same fever as it did now. She was coiled onto her right side, her back towards him, her hands clamped over an expanding red stain on her shirt.

Jeremy stood up, shaking, and wiped her blood from his face. He stepped closer to Sam's body. Jack felt sick.

"You get away from her, Jeremy!" shrieked a voice. Jeremy glanced towards Jessica's pale, livid face.

"This isn't your problem, Jess, so please shut the _fuck_ up," he muttered, pacing lopsided next to the fallen agent.

"Not my..." Jessica repeated in awe. Jack shook his head firmly in his direction, but she ignored him. "How is this _not_ my problem, Jeremy? You kidnapped me and my sister! My family trusted you, I trusted you, and you sold us out for what, drugs?"

"It's your own fucking mother's fault, okay?" The boy shouted angrily. "She pulled your entire family down with her when she got into this business..."

"And she's spent five years trying to drag herself out of it, only people like you won't let her!" The girl cried, tears spilling down her red face. "All this time," she murmured, trembling. "All this time I thought you were the only person who understood, who would always be there for me... I don't know who you are anymore."

Jeremy tapped the blade of his knife against his thigh impatiently. "You knew exactly who I was when you first met me, Jessi."

There was a frenzied silence which was promptly ended by a warbled cry. Jack's gaze snapped back to Samantha, and his body tensed.

"Jeremy, listen to me." The boy turned to Jack, lifting his knife. "I want you to think about what you're expecting will come out of this, if it goes any further."

"I know, I know, I know, I know..." Jeremy sputtered, squeezing the muscles in his face that twitched against his will. "I just...I just want what belongs to me, all right?"

He eyed Samantha's bag and Jack knew there were no drugs inside of it. "It's not gonna help you, Jeremy," Jack warned, keeping his voice level and forcing himself to keep his eyes on the kid and away from Samantha. "No matter what it does now, three weeks and you'll still be hungry, and hurting, and someone else will be on the ground, hurt bad because of mistakes _you_ made..." Jack sighed, and lowered his eyes. "But, if it belongs to you, it's your right."

Jeremy stared hard at the agent's slumped shoulders, and then straightened proudly. He sheathed the knife in a pocket and knelt by Samantha, ignoring her soft cries. Her eyes closed as Jeremy reached his hand into her bag. _Go, Sam_, Jack thought, head bent._ He'll realize it's not there any second. Go. GO._

The kid's fingers frantically searched the inside of the bag, then froze. He picked up the bag and shook its contents onto the floor, scrambling through them in a panic. "It's not...I can't find it..." he panted, bent over and trembling. Jack glanced past him to Samantha, and Samantha glanced past Jeremy where Jessica was standing slowly, her entire body quivering except for the loaded gun from Sam's holster, secured between her fingers.

"You _lied_ to me!" Jeremy screeched, advancing towards Jack with his knife outstretched. "You _lied_! You lied, you lied---"

BANG. Jeremy's eyes grew wide and his mouth fell open into a soundless cry before he crumpled to the ground.

Samantha's head shot up as the gun clattered from Jessica's hand to the floor. Her face was twinged with green, covered in a cold sweat. Her little sister, Tallulah, scrambled to the other side of the room where Jack sat and fumbled with the knot.

"Jessica," Samantha breathed, "it's okay...you did the right thing..." The girl tore her eyes away from the heap that was her boyfriend and looked towards Samantha.

"Are you okay?" she whispered hoarsely, kneeling down beside the agent. " Can I help...what do I..."

Samantha's pain flooded back into her mind with a fresh, new sharpness. She choked on her breath as the girl's trembling hand reached for her bleeding side, when--

"It's okay, Jessica, I've got her." Jack scooped an arm around her shoulders and under her neck. "I've got you, you're okay...easy..._easy_..."

She didn't know whether it was the strained catch in his voice, the feel of his arms, or the dizzying fear at the base of her stomach, but somewhere in the fatal combination of all those things, something squeezed tight and desperate at her throat and she cried, and cried, into the ruined sleeve of his shirt. Through the pounding in her ears, she managed to distinguish a familiar howl in the distance.

Jack looked up, head cocked. "What the..."

"Sirens," Samantha panted, feeling welcome relief drown some of her pain. "Sue...she did it... she called..."

Tallulah started. "Sue...Sue Allen? Aunt Sue's here? Where is she?"

"Outside." Samantha jerked her head towards the door, and the girl ran to kick the rusted aluminum slab open. On the other side, a middle-aged woman held a pistol steady in her hands, ready to shoot. When she saw her niece, her knees seemed to buckle, and an estranged cry tore from her.

"Oh, thank God!" she shouted as she pulled Tallulah and her sister into her arms. Samantha closed her eyes as the sweet smell of the rain diffused into the dank garage and gulped a deep breath of it.

"I can't do this---anymore," she said, breathing sharply, "Too old." She heard Jack's throaty laugh and opened her eyes. He was hunched over her left side and ripping off the hem of his shirt for a bandage. To steady her, he placed a broad hand, fingers spread wide, on her lower abdomen. Heat like fire shot through her entire body as she panicked and screamed.

Jack shot up, his face tense and searching. He removed his hand quickly. "What? What, does it hurt?" She didn't answer him. "Sam, honey, please...talk to me, tell me what's going on..."

She pulled onto his shirt to bring him closer. "Jack, I---"

Sue Allen ran to the doorway. "The EMT is here, Agent Spade!"

"Hold on, Samantha," Jack told her, ordered her, and Sam willed the strength in his voice to flow into her body. He pulled his hand away from her side, covered in blood, as the medical squad burst through the doorway.

"...knife wound to the left voluntary muscle system...

"...significant loss of blood..."

"...on three. One, two, _three..._"

Samantha bit onto her lip and tasted blood as the movement onto the stretcher sent searing pain through her left side. "Jack..." her mouth wasn't working properly. "Jack..."

"Right here," his voice answered, but she couldn't find him for the darkness. Then, she realized her eyes had closed, and from the weightless feeling spreading into her gut, she was falling quickly into unconsciousness.

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	13. Chapter 13

**A/N: **Yes, I'm sure everyone's aware I'm not the most expedient when it comes to posting these, but I hope you'll continue reading! Thanks for your support.

**

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**Chapter 14**

Samantha heard the beeping sound of her heart monitor first, steady and rhythmic.

She knew she was awake, even if her eyes refused to open. A fluttering panic rose to her chest as she struggled to lift her hands to her face, and the beeping grew more rapid as her struggle ensued.

"Ms. Spade, please! It's all right, just relax now, okay dear?" Cool wrinkled fingers worked their way through her damp hair and encircled her face. Samantha tried to speak but her voice was too raw and hoarse to be heard. Her body jerked as a wet cloth dabbed at the corners of her eyes, but the moisture felt wonderful and awakened a desperate thirst she hadn't recognized until just then.

Her eyes flew open and fell upon the face of an aged doctor who smiled at her through the darkness of her room. "That's better, isn't it?" She noticed Samantha's cracked lips and reached for a cup of water and a straw. "You must be thirsty as anything. No, please, relax. Just sips, for now."

Sam had lurched towards the cup but as the doctor's words warned her, she felt a breathtaking stab of pain in her side. Instead, she waited for the straw to be placed on her lips and drank deeply. The cold water soothed her throat and allowed her to speak.

"Thank you," she said hoarsely. "Dr..."

"Franklin," the woman replied, smiling and removing Samantha's chart from the base of her bed. Her eyes scanned the monitors and she scribbled something down. "And you're quite welcome. Although it seems I should be thanking you. You've been an ideal patient for me these past few days. Surgery was clean and you've been healing impecably. I doubt you'll even notice a scar 10 to 12 months from now...

_Past few days..._ Samantha swallowed. "How...how long have I been out?"

"A little over three days," Dr. Franklin answered, "You would have been conscious earlier except we needed to ensure the safety of your child before we could take any further risks in surgery."

"It's all right?" She asked weakly. The doctor smiled and nodded, and Samantha felt a surge of relief flood through her. "Okay...okay...thank you doctor..."

"Thankfully, your partner informed us of your condition before we operated, and absolutely no harm was done to the baby during surgery..." Samantha's eyes flew open. "Something wrong?"

"N-no," she mumbled, "my partner told you, you said? Who was...?" The doctor opened her lips to speak, then closed them.

"Now I must be losing my mind," she chuckled, lifting the chart again from the slot of Samantha's bed, "Old age is a terrible thing, Ms. Spade...ah, there we are...an Agent Jack Malone. He rode with you in the ambulance on the way to the hospital. He's here now, if you'd like to see him. In fact, you've got quite a hoard of admirers waiting to see how you are, Samantha. If you're feeling well enough, I can send a few in at a time."

Truthfully, Samantha felt as if she could sleep for at least 24 more hours without waking, but she nodded briskly to the doctor who smiled and left the dimly lit hospital room. She could barely think, barely breathe. Thoughts whirled around her head like wisps of smoke and she could not find any order to them except..._he knew_.

She heard voices echoing down the hallway seconds before they came in. Their faces seemed to contain individual beams of light that made her eyes ache and her head swell. Thankfully, someone had warned them to talk softly to her, because their screams were muffled to gasps and sighs.

Sam couldn't interpret exactly what they all said, but she recognized their faces. Her mother, at her side, kissing her forehead. Her sister, Veronica, and her husband, next to her mother. Vivian stood at the base of the bed, tears forming in the corners of her eyes, and Danny beside her, and then Martin. She glanced up at him and he stroked her cheek gently and mumbled something she didn't understand.

And there, leaning against the doorway, stood Jack. He looked like hell. The bruises she remembered from three days ago still marked his face, and he favored his right knee. She suspected he was in a hell of a lot more pain than he let on, and suddenly began to cry. Her mother cradled her head and Martin squeezed her hand (his own was trembling slightly) and the air around her seemed not to be air but a suffocating gas and she could barely breathe. Jack bowed out of the room. He had not met her gaze when she'd looked at him.

He knew. They all knew. Her mother, her sister, Vivian, Danny, Martin, and now Jack. Suddenly, it felt as if a hand constricted around her heart as the course of the next few months seemed to plot themselves out before her very eyes.

Her mother, planning a lavish wedding within the time span of a month, before she started to show, of course.

The invitations flying out to all corners of the country.

Someone suggesting maternity leave, effective immediately.

Handing over her gun and her badge _but it's only temporary, your position will be ready and waiting for you as soon as you're ready, no one would _think_ of replacing you Samantha_.

She would recover from the wound on her side and somewhere in the rush Martin would propose to her. Her mother has ordered the catering service before he's done so, and has reminded her of it even the hour before Martin picks her up for dinner at a ridiculously expensive restaurant.

He's paid a violinist who Samantha remembers seeing sleeping outside her building weeks earlier.

She opens her eyes again, and she's in a brilliant white gown with a bouquet of flowers, and barely breathing. She hasn't seen him in a month. He was the last to accept the invitation.

The organ swells and someone touches her shoulder...


	14. Chapter 14

**Author's Note: **Spring break! I'm puttin' 'em to the wall, if you know what I mean, with this thing. I know it's just a bloody awful ending to leave you with, but I'm workin' as fast as I can! And sorry for the confusion with the conclusion of chapter 14. Hopefully this will clear things up. Thanks again for the continued support!

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**Chapter 15**

All around her, there was white.

The ribbons, the flowers, the vestments: everything gleamed enough to make her eyes water, and she lifted a hand to press against her lashes. She froze. Mascara. White glove.

"Shit." A black smudge ran along the finger of her expensive silk glove, and she glanced up to see a bewildered alter boy staring at her, wide-eyed. "Sorry," she muttered, and replaced her hands by her side.

Oh, god, the _dress_. If she had ever believed any snowfall in upstate New York to justify 'white', she seriously reconsidered 'gray' as more appropriate now, looking down at the folds of fabric flowing from her bodice. Even the pearls embroidered neatly onto the hem of her neckline seemed to emmanate their own source of light.

Her mother had outdone herself. Samantha would have been happy with the simple dress her mother had worn to her own wedding.

_Would have been happy._

Her throat stuck when she tried to swallow, and someone touched her on the shoulder as the organ swelled.

"Samantha," her stepfather whispered, "it's about that time."

She squeezed out a smile and took a step forward. The doors to the cathedral opened and a breath of air swept the delicate veil against her face. Beneath it, her eyes widened to take in the massive amount of people on both sides of the aisle. Tuxedos, gowns, hats, jewelry, corsages, and a stifling scent of perfume and incense nearly overwhelmed her. But she kept walking without telling her feet to follow one another, a talent she had mastered in the past month.

As the organist sent "The Wedding March" echoing to the sharp, expansive ceiling overhead, and since she no longer needed her mind to spur her to motion, she found it beginning to wander, and barely heard her stepfather's occasional whisper of encouragement.

She found herself thinking of the very last time she had entered this church, almost fifteen years ago. She had been nineteen and it was the first time she had come to the church separate from her family. Her granddad's funeral. Sam had been seated next to her grandmother, who would sit with no one else besides her. Samantha had been her favorite.

When they went to the coffin to pay their last respects, her grandmother seized her arm and nearly made her nineteen-year-old self yelp in surprise.

"Listen to me, Sam," she hissed in her ear, "Sunday after Sunday, it's just pretend. You sit and you listen, and it's all well and good, but there's two times in your life when you're gonna come here and it will be real. The first time you'll be wearing white, and the second, black. Don't fuck it up when it counts, Sam. It ain't worth living for, if it ain't real."

Sam had never heard her grandmother speak that way, and would never again. The lady died, barely three months after the funeral.

She'd never told anyone that story. And, until now, she never knew why. But fifteen years later, it was as if the woman stood next to her once again, scratching blood to the surface of her arm, and breathing raspily into her ear.

_"It ain't worth living for, if it ain't real, honey." _

Hands lifted and slowly folded the translucent veil high up and behind her face. Light diffused around the frame of the man in front of her. Martin's face, somber but not unhappy, filled her entire field of vision. Her lips parted.

"What's that, honey?"

The music had stopped, and people on either sides of her stirred, the rustling of chiffon and silk amplified by the resonant cathedral acoustics.

_"Did she say something?"_

_"What did she say?"_

_"Is she all right?"_

_"George, the camera."_

_"I heard she was pregnant."_

Martin was looking at her dumbfounded, still clutching her hand in his, ring dangling from the tip of his trembling finger. The priest placed a hand on Samantha's arm and squeezed.

_"Make it count."_

"What?!" Samantha gasped, jerking her head in his direction. The wrinkled face rose its eyebrows.

"I said 'Are you all right, child?'" he repeated concernedly. Martin's eyes moved to Samantha's forehead were followed by his cool fingers.

"She's burning up!" Martin exclaimed, shaking himself out of the mini-stupor he'd fallen into. "Sam, are you okay? Do you feel weak?" He took her by the arm, and pressed her to his chest. She was grateful, surprisingly, despite the fact that she felt no worse than she had in the days leading up to the wedding. "Deborah!"

Her mother jogged up the steps in front of the alter. "She's just overwhelmed, Martin," she said, and Samantha looked from her mother to Martin. "Just give her a few minutes. She just needs some water, that's all. Jack, will you take her? Thanks."

She turned to the throng of people straining to hear what was happening and smiled broadly. "Everything's fine, everyone! Samantha's just a little over-heated, that's all...and wouldn't you believe it with this weather! Just a few minutes..."

Samantha's eyes slid from Martin's face as she was delivered as a heap of heavy silk into two broad arms. This time, she had to _tell_ her legs to move forward.

The smell of incense lessened, the white sunlight faded, and she was standing in the parish rectory, and Jack was handing her a drink.


	15. Chapter 15

**Chapter 16**

**So very very very very sorry that I haven't done ANYTHING with this in forever! Happened to stumble upon it the other day, re read it, and decided not to give up on it after all. Will try to be a bit more regular now. Thanks for those of you who decide to check in with this old thing in the future :)**

* * *

Without a word, she sank into a chair beneath the windowsill, her dress wilting about her legs like a ruined bouquet. Samantha could feel her entire body trembling as she put her head against the sill and breathed the air that crept in from the screen. It was little better than what the church was filled with—the temperature had almost reached its peak of 91 degrees.

"You should drink something," a not unkind voice grunted, and she blindly obeyed, taking the glass from the outstretched hand. The water was had no ice but was refreshing. Sam kept her eyes closed and just focused on breathing.

"I wasn't sure you were coming or not," she said, exhaling. "I don't think I'd have blamed you if you didn't."

"Sam, we've barely spoken since the accident, and I take full responsibility for that…"

She shook her head. "I'm sorry, Jack, but I don't think I'm physically capable of our usual exchanges of guilt."

Jack nodded. After a moment, he lifted up a heavy upholstered chair and sat it next to hers by the window so that their arms almost grazed each other. "Shit, it's hot."

She laughed abruptly and instantly regretted it as her brain throbbed against her skull. "Mom wouldn't wait more than a month. I don't think she could have swallowed her husband escorting a bulging belly down any cathedral aisle."

He gave a smile, but it froze on his lips as she could see the old self-hatred descend upon him, momentarily uplifted. "I, uh, wanted to congratulate you. Many times, you know, but I couldn't." He hesitated. "I think I can now. We owe each other civility at least, don't we?"

"Jack, the very last thing I care about right now is being civil. What I want more than anything is to rip this ridiculous thing off of me and dive into a really cold lake somewhere." Sam opened her eyes and pulled herself upright, looking towards the door to the chapel. "She'll be back soon."

"Door's locked."

She could've leapt for joy.

Instead, she turned back to Jack and looked into his face, unexpectedly calm. "I tried to tell you that day, at the warehouse. I was about to say it when I think they sedated me. I wanted it to be me who told you; I guess I should've earlier, but I didn't want you to find out the way you did."

Sam caught herself and frowned. "How _did_ you find out, anyway? I always kind of assumed Viv had told you when you reported in…"

Jack opened his mouth to respond when several very sharp raps on the door interrupted him. The voice of Samantha's mother reverberated through the ancient room.

"Samantha, _dear_, do you think you're quite recovered? Everyone's waiting! Martin's worried, and would like to see you're all right!" Her voice lowered to a stinging hiss. "Samantha Spade, we do _not_ have the kind of time to be postponing things right now, _if you know what I mean!_"

"Jesus, mother! The baby's not going to pop out in the next fifteen minutes!" Jack snorted and covered a grin with his broad fist. Sam reddened and laughed embarrassedly under her breath. "Just…give me a minute, please?"

Her mother's silence apparently informed her that her request had been granted.

"Do you want to know how I feel, Jack? Well, here it is: I don't want to get married. Did you hear me? I. Don't. Want. To. Get. Married. But I'm not thinking for myself anymore, am I? I've got somebody else to think about now, haven't I? I wouldn't have this baby out of wedlock, I just wouldn't. It wouldn't be fair to it, and life sucks enough as it is without having that hanging over your head as a kid."

She suddenly breezed from the chair and to her feet. Dizzy, but unwilling to cop to it, she danced from one foot to the other, hands on her hips. She stopped.

"You know, I…" she swallowed, feeling her throat tighten. "I wished for a miscarriage."

The silence that followed made the word echo in her mind; there was no sound in the room besides the blood pumping in her ears. Her bare shoulders caved as she began to shake again. "I'm so ashamed…"

She jerked her head up onto her shoulders and spun around. "So you see how I can't get married. You see me, right? I can't. Not like this. Not like I am."

_As you are_. Jack dragged his eyes up from his hands to face her. God, if she knew what he saw as he looked at her. Skin glowing from the heat within and without. Eyes ablaze. Hair slightly undone and bedraggled. He felt very old.

Jack.

_Jack_.

"…never felt so trapped. Do you see what I'm up against here? I can't stay inside this room forever. I go out there and it's over. But I can't stay in here. I've got no where to go…"

All the defenses he'd built for himself, fortresses around his heart and mind, were disintegrating. One of the most powerful men in the city, and his best work crumbled before him.

"…to be pregnant! I don't want this now…can't deal with this now…"

Her hands clawed at her throat where the delicate lace of the dress collected. The skin there was breaking out in an angry red color. She needed out. He knew the feeling.

He shouldn't have come in here.

Jack swept out of the chair and was in front of her in a blur of movement. His fingers worked the clasp around her throat and tore the fabric from her skin. Her breath was fast and hot against his face as she desperately pulled the dress from her body. It was past her shoulders; she wriggled free. It hung at her ankles.

She gripped the mound of hair at the back of her hair and heaved deep, long breaths. All that remained was the corset around her torso and the ivory slip that fell to her calves.

He hung back, almost hunched as in homage, ashamed and lustful of his work. His hands boiled and throbbed where they hung at his sides.

"I want to go swimming, Jack. Find me a lake."

Done. He was out the door. He was in his car, driving, speeding, demanding information from the rangers on the highway, pulling rank, speeding, speeding, crashing for the water—

"You've got to face them, Samantha." She opened her eyes in disgust, disgusted with him, he knew. "I can be behind you, but I can't let you run away." He took a step to the side and put his hands in his pockets. "_You_ won't let you run away."

She moved over to him, countering his evasion. "If it were yours, Jack, would you be letting me do this?"

"Don't do that, Sam." She lifted the slip higher, higher up her leg until it bared the garters and lingerie she wore. Sam pulled one hand from his pocket and slid it over her side. The barely dissolved stitches and newly forming scar were rough under his fingers.

"Is it yours, Jack?" Sam asked pleadingly, begging him to tell her, willing him to know by the hand on her abdomen. Their eyes met. The heat beneath his fingers grew in intensity. He couldn't bear much more.

There was the knocking again. There was the piercing voice, inquiring, demanding, scolding.

He pulled her close to him, curling his hand beneath her hair. Their faces were inches from each other.

"Sam, whatever happens, whatever you end up doing today, tomorrow, next year, you can _always_ come to me, do you understand that? I will take care of you, whenever you need me. I swear to God. But right now, you need to put Martin's ring on your finger. You have to go back out there, sweetheart, because I know he can put things right for you. He'll support you."

Her eyes were wide and searching. "Promise what you said, before. Promise me."

"Sam, I made that promise the first day we met. Now, go. Go!" She reached up and grasped his face with one trembling hand, as if memorizing his face. And then, she was gone.

Gone again.

And Jack was left alone with the shambles of a life he had spent months sorting together. Left alone to build again.


	16. Chapter 16

Okay, guys, bear with me here. I'm gonna finish it even if no one's left out there! Sorry for the confusing jumps around. It's sorta becoming a common theme here.

**Chapter 17**

**The Suburbs of Chicago**

"Dammit!"

She pushed a strand of hair from her face and impatiently smashed the back of her hand to her nose to wipe away the sweat. The sun beat down on the back of her neck—the skin there was beginning to burn—but she didn't care. On the stoop of her doorstep she sat with wrench and rag in hand, using her entire weight to try to loosen the bolt which bound the ruined tire to her bicycle.

Her grasp slipped and the wrench flew from her hands to the sidewalk several steps below her. Nearly throwing the bike from her lap she jumped the steps and snatched it from the ground. "Couldn't just _buy_ another one, could we? It's vintage, is it? It's vintage shit, is what it is…"

She could feel her spine aching already from sitting hunched like that for so long. Reluctantly, it allowed her to crumple back into that shape and try again. Attacking the ruined wheel with fervor, she muttered under her breath. "Come on, you little fu—"

"Harley! Language, _please_!"

Two pairs of identical bark-colored eyes met, and one rolled sarcastically. "Mom, seriously. I'm—"

"Nine! Nine years old! You're not supposed to even know _how _to use those words! Do you know what nine-year-olds are supposed to be talking about? Shopping! Fun stories from their from their _fourth _grade class!"

Harley crossed her arms and shifted all her weight to one leg. "You're right. Except for I'm in fifth grade."

"And that's so much diff—" Her mother's voice suddenly failed her. Never giving up, Harley didn't relax her stance, but her confusion was evident nonetheless. They had argued thousands of times before, just like this—what was the big deal? Her brow furrowed.

"What? Do I have grease on my face?" she scoffed uneasily. She knew they had a dinner party later tonight; maybe she was mad she hadn't cleaned up yet. Leaving the bike sprawled out for someone to trip over? She didn't think she'd mouthed off more than usual. Harley suddenly grew very anxious, her true age shining through. "Mommy, what's wrong? I'm sorry I swore, okay? I'll try to stop, okay Mom?"

But it was not the swearing that had abruptly rendered her mother speechless. It was not the state of the bike blocking the doorway to their home. It wasn't even the grease and dirt which was smeared across her sunburned cheeks.

The source of her mother's muteness was something very new and completely different. She was looking directly into her daughter's face and something was there which had not been there before. Shame flooded her mother as she realized perhaps it had been, and for quite a while, but she had been so busy with work so as not to notice it. Her daughter's face was not the chubby oval of a prepubescent child anymore—it had shed the deceptive sheen of youth and the first hints of what it was to be come had shown through.

Her mother gazed at her so intensely that Harley finally relented and flung her arms around her mother's tailored business suit, burying her face into the polyester. But what her mother had seen was still emblazoned in her memory. It was the slightly upturned upper lip. It was the crease between the eyebrows. It was the defensively accusatory stare. It was the shadow of a face she hadn't seen for nearly a decade.

Samantha looked into her daughter's face, and Jack's had stared right back.

--

She was a wreck the rest of the afternoon, and Martin's frustration with her was apparent. It was the night of the dinner which everyone knew would determine whether he would be promoted to the position from which his boss was retiring or not. He had only asked one thing of her--a passable pot roast, some wine, and a little perfume. So far, she'd almost burnt the roast, was on her third glass of their only bottle of pinot and had dropped and shattered her most expensive vial of Chanel No. 5.

Harley knew better than to press her mother over what strange thing had come over her outside on the stoop, and Sam was grateful from this. At least she had inherited something good from her side: her intuition. _And his chin_.

"Shut up!" She banged her hand down hard on the cutting board and several finely shaved radish garnishes flew through the air. The dog immediately scarfed down the delicate roses before she could reach them. "No! Shit! Dog, no! Oh, shit, SHIT!"

The hairs on the back of Sam's neck bristled and slowly she looked up. Harley stood in the doorway, her dinner dress limp around her waist. A mixture of fear and humor twisted her expression. "Okay, Harely, when the dog eats something you've been working the past forty minutes on making and have to start all over, _then_ you can say grown up words, okay?"

She nodded and came over to where Samantha was kneeling. "Zip me?"

Sam sighed and turned her daughter around, tugging the stubborn zipper up to her shoulders. "Sorry mommy's a little neurotic today, Bean."

"It's okay, mommy."

She sighed and stared into space.

"Mommy?"

"Yeah, baby?"

"What does 'neurotic' mean?"

"It means we're serving Daddy's boss overdone pot roast with no alcohol to wash it down," Martin suddenly interrupted, sweeping into the room with a tie flung around his neck. Samantha straightened up and grabbed his shoulders. He submitted as she began to work on his tie.

"Martin, the roast's fine," she said as calmly as she could. He dragged his hand through his miraculously not-graying hair and sighed. "It's just not as moist as it could be. And they're not going to decide whether to hire you or not hire you based on the quality of cooking you're afforded at home."

He ignored her. "Harley, go put your patent leather shoes on, please? They could be here any minutes."

Harley's shoulders sagged. _I _hate_ those shoes,_ it read_. Because if you want the shoes, you want the--_

"Don't forget the ruffle socks," he threw in before breaking away to pour himself a scotch. The nine-year-old slouched off, biting back more scathing words than any of those she'd spat out previously. "What am I forgetting?"

Samantha looked around the kitchen and peered into the dining room. The places were set, windows opened to let in a little of the spring breeze. Despite the dryness of the pork (she would season it later) and the sparcity of wine (there was always Martin's scotch), things were for all outward appearances running smoothly.

"I think you've covered everything," she answered, sitting across the island from him. Samantha appeared to be the picture of an attentive wife by the way she was studying her husband's face. But the study served a different purpose altogether. Each slight movement, each change in profile, each angle of his face further provided her substantiating evidence. She told herself it was all in her head, that it was the heat, but look at that nose! Those ears! That mouth! All so obviously Irish and New English! God, it was a wonder Martin hadn't been asking questions years ago! Their daughter was an Italian Mofia brat!

Harley popped her head in. "Daddy, there's a car on the street."

Martin downed the contents of his glass and ran to the door, smashing his hand over her head in thanks. Sam smiled a small sigh of relief. Harley's light amber hair, button nose, pink cheeks were as Irish as they came. Look at her: she was practically speaking the language with the mouth on her!

_The mouth on her. _The slightly upturned top lip. The cheeks not so much pink as they were warmed with sun. Amber hair betraying hints of future shades at its root. Skin glowing from the sunburn, not red and angry as the Fitzgerald skin always became when outside in the direct sun for too long. No, hers reveled in the exposure, craved more to enhance the easily mistaken tones beneath her skin--the olive brown pigments, inheritance of a dominant, unusually foul-mouthed and hot-tempered Italian gene--

"...yes, I don't know where she must have gone to. Sweetheart!" Samantha jumped as now Martin's face reappeared at the threshold to the kitchen. "The Nelsons have just arrived, _wouldn't you like to come welcome them?_"

Immediately, she filed the thoughts away to all the others which she set aside when Martin's priorities overwhelmed them. She had a show to put on.


	17. Chapter 17

**Chapter 17**

No. Not an appropriate time, Samantha. No.

She took a sip of her coffee.

Five minutes tops. Come on; say you're going to check on Harley. They won't even notice you're gone. Everything's going so well, anyway. They probably want some alone time with him, right? You'd be doing him a _favor_.

_No_.

Samantha took another sip of her coffee and passed her eyes over the grandfather clock behind the couch. Nine thirty-seven. See? Now he'll probably be asleep by the time you—

"Sweetheart, didn't you want to make sure Harley was in bed?" She spilled some of her coffee into its saucer. Martin was looking in her direction with a relaxed smile; finally he seemed to be unclenching.

Hey, if he was asking for it, then…

"You're absolutely right. I was just thinking about how I could politely excuse myself, anyway!" Their company laughed indulgently and she gracefully floated from the room. God, she could put on a sweet performance; it was seamless, perfect.

Harley, of course, wasn't in bed. She sat at her computer one leg propped up to support her head, typing furiously. Samantha knocked pointedly on the doorframe and her daughter spun around, guilt apparent on her face. She didn't even try to make excuses, which made Samantha smile.

"I'm going into my bedroom," Samantha said solemnly. "I plan on being in my bedroom for about five minutes. I'm then going to come back into this room to kiss my _sleeping_ daughter goodnight. What do you think?"

Harley's eyes were wide. "That's a very good plan, Mommy."

Samantha nodded and casually made her way out of the room. As soon as she was out of sight, she locked the door to hers and Martin's room and snatched the phone from its holster. Her heart was beating wildly so she sat down on her bed; she inadvertently pressed the 'talk' button and the dial tone vibrated against her chest.

Dial. Just dial. Dial. It's probably a different number anyway. Dial.

She obeyed. You probably don't even remember—

Her fingers punched ten digits into the keypad defiantly. She could hear the phone ringing from where it lay in her hands. _Ohshitohshitohshit._ Samantha stared at it. It was ringing. Where was the high-pitched automated voice telling her the number was no longer in service? This had to be like the fifth ring already. It usually came after the first one, or had that changed? Probably had changed.

"This is Harrison."

She nearly dropped the phone. "Uh, yes, hi. Um, is this the Missing Persons Unit? I may have dialed the wrong—"

"If you're reporting a missing person, call police headquarters," the man's voice cut in gruffly. She remembered that tone of voice—worn thin with exhaustion, impatient with civilian interruption.

"I'm looking for an agent…last name Malone? I don't know if he still works there. This used to be his extension…"

"I'll put you through." The line clicked.

"No, wait! No, I was just wondering if he—" The line clicked a second time and someone cleared his throat. Samantha felt faint.

"Malone."

_Malone_.

Mah-loan. What an odd name. Or maybe she thought it was odd because she'd been thinking it over and over in her head for the past hour. You know how you can say a word a bunch of times and then eventually it sounds like a completely different word? Malone. Mah-lone. _Malonemalonemalonemalonema—_

"Jesus, you son of a bitch. Are you that pathetic that the best use of your time you can come up with is drunk-dialing FBI agents? Please, just give me the first two digits of your license plate. Let's play a game called 'Agent Malone gets your car seized by the IRS…'"

"Jack?" The voice cut off abruptly. There was absolute silence, except for the humming of the phone line.

"Yes?"

Samantha squeezed her eyes shut, covering her face with her free hand. "It's Samantha."

"Yes." There was another pause. _Jesus Christ, Jack, could you make this any harder for me?_ "Yes! Sorry, how are you Samantha?"

"Listen, I've got to talk to you. Will you be in the city this weekend?"

"Yeah, I will."

"Should I meet you at the office Friday night?"

"If you want, but I, uh," he hesitated. "Well, I live midtown now, right near the building, if you wanted to just go there—to my apartment, I mean—instead."

Samantha rubbed her forehead slowly. He'd moved out of the apartment. Which meant his family had left the city, as they had been threatening to do before. She wondered when that had happened.

"I could pick you up at the airport." Jack's voice interrupted her thoughts. She blinked. She honestly hadn't thought of that as an option.

"That would be…that would be good," she murmured. "I'll call you when I know where I'll be flying into."

"Okay." It was like they were arranging a go-see on a case together, as if they had been doing this regularly for the past eight years without interruption. He didn't ask questions. She didn't offer explanations. "So I'll see you Friday."

"Friday," she repeated. After a moment, she added, "Thanks, Jack."

She heard him sigh. "You're welcome."

--

After washing her face, Samantha stood outside her daughter's room. Harley was asleep—or pretending to be asleep—and so she walked inside as quietly as she could over the hardwood floor before sitting down next to her on her bed.

"Harley," she whispered, putting a hand on her shoulder. Samantha raised her eyebrows, impressed. Either she was getting very good at this act, or she had actually obeyed her orders. "Harley, honey, wake up."

Harley rolled over, groaning. "I don't get it. Wasn't I _supposed_ to be asleep?"

Sam smiled and nodded. "Yes, you were, and I'm very happy to see that. But, listen, I have to ask you something." Harley rubbed her eyes, instantly alert. Samantha nostalgically remembered when she could be fully awoken with as little prodding at that. "I have to go to New York City this weekend."

"Can I come?"

She hesitated. "Well, that's what I wanted to ask you, baby. I've got to take care of some business with an old friend and it would be mostly grown-up talk."

"I want to go!" Harley's eyes gleamed at the prospect of flying. She loved flying. "I'll be good. I won't curse, I promise."

Samantha drew her fingers along her smooth, rounded cheek and gazed into the ever-familiar eyes. She didn't know if it was because she was looking for similarities or if it was because she had been blind to them for so long before, but there they were. Her stomach suddenly grabbed at her. It was too much, too much for her to put on those little shoulders.

"Harley, what if you and I and Daddy all went to NYC in a couple more weeks, when your vacation starts and then we can see the Statue of Liberty and ride a carriage all together without that boring adult stuff, huh?" Harley's eyes clouded with disappointment.

"Well, why'd you wake me up then?" She rolled back on her side, and Samantha closed her eyes. "Are you still going this weekend?"

"I have to, Harley." She kissed her daughter's cheek. "I'll bring you back something special, okay? Don't worry, Daddy will have something fun for you two to do."

"Night, Mommy." One last look, and Samantha was gone. It had been a good fifteen minutes. Martin was probably about to explode.

To her surprise, when she returned downstairs, the party was on its feet and shuffling good-naturedly towards the door. His boss looked up as she descended the staircase. "Mrs. Fitzgerald! We were hoping we'd be able to pay our compliments to you for the roast before we left!"

"Sorry, Harley was putting up a bit of a fight," Samantha lied, and feeling terrible about it.

"I only wish we had had more children," the boss's wife sighed, eyes sparkling with moisture. The woman was a carbon copy of the 1950s baby-maker wife, and had alluded to additions to the Fitzgerald family all evening. "They're such a joy."

Samantha suddenly wished her daughter's mouth had made an appearance tonight. With relish, she fantasized about what would have been the middle-aged housewife's reaction.

Less than five minutes later, they had successfully herded the couple from their home and waved, smiling, from the driveway as they drove away. When they had disappeared, Martin laughed and swiveled Sam around. He kissed her full and swift on the lips. "Oh, you were _fantastic_! Couldn't have played it better. And they weren't kidding either—they actually liked your roast!"

Sam frowned. "Martin, I'm a good cook. They should like my roast. They should _love _my roast." She shuddered. "Jesus, didn't they creep you out? I feel like I just spent the evening in a cookie-cutter in Mayberry."

Martin's eyebrows furrowed. "I think it's endearing how old-fashioned they are."

Samantha stared at him in awe before turning back into the house. "I've got to go to New York this weekend," she called over her shoulder, stripping from her evening attire as she spoke. "My flight's in the morning tomorrow."

Martin locked the door before leaning against it. "You didn't mention this before now?"

"Just came up," she said honestly. "I won't be gone long. I should be back by Monday to take Harley to school." Martin scratched the back of his neck and shrugged his shoulders.

"Uh, fine, sure. I'll take Harley into the city on Saturday. She's been wanting to go to the museum for a while anyway." Samantha nodded; she was now down to her black pencil skirt and bra. Martin loosened his tie and looked at her with limpid eyes. She knew what he wanted, but Jack had infected her mind.

"I'm really tired, Martin," she said, walking over to him to kiss his cheek. "You weren't so bad yourself tonight."

Martin watched her mount the stairs, his eyes following the sumptuous curves of her waist and legs. "Thanks," he murmured before pouring himself a generous glass of merlot.


	18. Chapter 18

Chapter 18

Chapter 18

11:37 p.m.

The truth was he didn't have time to let the reality of what had just transpired register in his mind. It had taken the last remaining shreds of energy left in him to come off as what he hoped was cool and collected. Shit. _Cool and collected?_ He closed his eyes, wincing as he replayed the barely five minute conversation in his mind. Cool had translated into arrogant and collected into indifference. Jesus, he was a dick.

But, come on, given the _circumstances..._ what more could you want?

The day couldn't have been worse. In a series of unsuccessful cases and ever more weakening government funding, yet another dead end. Another waste of money the state couldn't afford to lose left him with very little faith in the security of his position.

The only way the average son of a bitch could swallow it all without suffocating yourself was to keep it all at the surface. At work, shut it down from the inside. Leave it behind you when you get the hell home. Work is the last place you let yourself loose even for an instant. In the field, they call it the second's difference between a bullet to the head or to the shoulder. Behind a desk, it meant losing your job and your career. Jack never could differentiate between the two.

The instant he heard her voice, he knew he was fucked. Sure enough, less than five minutes had allowed the most promising lead they'd had in days to go cold and provoked Fitzgerald the Senior to another crusade against the 'mismanagement of one of the most vital departments in the FBI.'

He took the heat, at least made some sort of effort to let it glance off of him without any confrontation, but didn't stick around to watch the fallout.

And as difficult as it was, he left the bottle of bourbon he'd picked up in the trunk of his car.

She'd opened him up, caught him unawares—she always had—and just that briefest hesitation left him just as vulnerable as he'd been nearly a decade before. It wasn't just his fucking job. Undressing himself in his unkempt studio apartment, all the aches and pains—old battle wounds and new—suddenly seized control of his body. His knee killed, back throbbed, and sobriety was a burden.

Jack dropped himself down on the side of his bed, groaning and letting his head fall to his chest. His eyes lifted and caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror.

He grunted. "No fuckin' way," he mumbled to himself for no particular reason.

Having nothing to offer and wanting nothing from her, as he suddenly realized that he was, gave him unexpected peace and so he slept.

12:29 a.m.

Samantha plus a decade. Jack grunted. God, it probably looked horrible on her. Ten years with Martin Fitzgerald, as a Fitzgerald housewife who wasn't. The inner turmoil has to just _read_ on her face. Creams and hair dye.

Oh, Jack, what_ever_ has been wearing down on you so apparently these past ten long years?

I've been protecting the people from themselves. My appearance is nothing to the knowledge of their security. But what about you? I hear you've joined a book club. Well, that must be just a bitch to plan for all those weeks in advance, not knowing who'll RSVP and when...

_I bet the kid looks just like him, the little _fucker.

He rolled over on his side, settling against the cheap Sears air mattress. Not a flipping thing for him to lose any sleep for.

3:09 a.m.

Jack woke up with a start, sweating and out of breath.

He shook his head and wiped his forehead. "Hardly, hardly..." He repeated this to himself over and over and didn't know why.

7:40 a.m.

Four and a half hours later, Samantha Fitzgerald's plane landed an hour and ten minutes early into LaGuardia. She wore an off-the-shoulder overnight bag and a frown which emphasized the strain in her features. Jack was no where to be found.


End file.
